election depression

I'm still struggling to put my thoughts into words.

I woke up late Wednesday morning. Somehow my phone had turned itself off during the night - even though it was on the charger, so the battery was not dead - which meant my alarm didn't go off. I woke up half an hour after my son's school started. He had slept through his alarm (but he does that every day lately).

Even so, I couldn't hurry. I made him breakfast. He got ready for school. We drove there quietly. I went to the office with him, to sign him in. On the sign in sheet, three names up, somebody's parent had given "election depression" as the reason for tardiness.

I thought, "yeah, that's exactly right," but I didn't want to seem like a copycat so I just left that box blank.

I had planned to go riding, like I do pretty much every Wednesday, but the wind was pretty vicious and when I texted M she said the wind was so bad at her place that she didn't think it was safe to ride. So I stayed home. I played Baldur's Gate on my computer. I looked up recipes. At one point my boss texted me to complain about the frosting I'd used on a cake Tuesday. The frosting was too thin; I'd ended up having to pour it on the cake. It was her recipe, and I'd added more than three times the amount of powdered sugar to it, trying to get it to thicken, but it just wouldn't thicken. I ignored those texts. I told myself to do some homework, but I didn't do that. I couldn't do that - it was too hard to focus on mental tasks. In the evening I sewed a new scarf while watching Project Runway with my son and husband. It's our shared guilty pleasure. My boss texted me again before I went to bed, asking me to come in an hour earlier today. I slept as though I'd worked the whole day.

I don't normally work on Thursdays, but my boss had asked me to cover for her so she could do a catering event.

I got up this morning feeling mostly rested, if not restful. I told my boss I'd try to get there at the earlier time. Then I went riding.

It was windy as hell, still, but not dangerously so.

Dash is always spooky when it's windy, and I didn't have as much time as I'd wanted, but we managed to accomplish something awesome despite that: Dash trotted for about six consecutive strides, twice.

I know, I know. That sounds... like a thing all horses can do.
Dash hates trotting. He has two speeds: walk and canter. I hadn't actually gotten him to trot before today, but I can tell you that his canter is so ridiculously bumpy that I have a hell of time riding it. I assumed his trot would be equally bouncy.
But today, four of those strides were actually smooth. It almost felt like a jog. And and I got him to move between speeds - like going from a slow walk to a fast walk without breaking out into a canter. I was so damn happy I didn't even mind that we had to cut our time short to accommodate my boss. Well, I didn't mind horribly I mean.

One of these days I'll get video of Dash's gaits. I've never felt so much vertical movement in a horse's canter before. It's like flying lead changes but not.

Also, I've learned that keeping those heels way down is probably the most important thing I have to learn about riding Dash.

That's my focus right now.

On Saturday I'm going to a protest.
Next week I'm hosting a comfort food party at my house.
But right now, I'm riding my horse.
It's the best I can do.