Mitty, The Red Bay

His name is Mitty. A red bay, 16 year old Mustang with mane and tail like obsidian. I hardly know him yet, but oh, I will. Why? Because he’s mine. 

I can’t believe I’m doing this. From the time I was three, I have been captivated by this creature, this animal born of the wind, the horse. All through my childhood I dreamed, prayed for this day. Then it came. I have decided to become a horse owner. 

His name is Mitty because in congruence with the film “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,” I feel crazy and adventurous in this adopting of Mitty. This may seem relatively commonplace to some, but honestly, it is something to say I am a  delightfully married mother of two little boys and during a pandemic I have decided to buy a horse.

Yet like Walter Mitty, I am through with dreaming it and not living it, and I must follow the wild call for my heart to do the seemingly impossible, to live the callings that the dreams arise and beckon to from afar. 

There is a beauty and a freedom to living this way, to be adventurous and go where one is called. 

This story is just beginning, this Walter Mitty-like tale. 

Like Sean O’Connell says in the film, “Sometimes I don't. If I like a moment, for me, personally, I don't like to have the distraction of the camera. I just want to stay in it.

Walter Mitty replies, “Stay in it?”

Sean O'Connell then says, “Yeah. Right there. Right here.” 

My Mitty looks at me with those chocolate eyes and he breathes into my palm, and I hold my sons close and grasp my husband’s hand. 

Wife, mother, equestrian. What does that look like? I’ve yet to truly find out, but I’m on for the ride and it’s bright with promise. 

Yes. Right there. Right here.