Andrea's Rambling Notes - once from Japan, now from Canada

::Andrea's Rambling Notes - once from Japan, now from Canada::

My notes and my memories: sometimes about a mom - sometimes about a wife - sometimes about a woman - sometimes about our life

::Author::

Name::Andrea
From::Small city/town, B.C., Canada
I am a short girl from the west cost of BC, Canada and I am a proud Canadian. I went to Japan in 2000 because my Dad told me I would regret it for the rest of my life if I didn't. He was right. I lived a good life found my husband from the other side of the world and have a beautiful daughter. Basically we lead a pretty normal life filled with normal ups and downs. We both come from different cultures: me Canadian, him Chinese. Living in Japan was a real eye opener about who I am and about the people I associate myself with. I lived and loved in Japan but the time to move on came upon us and in May of 2006 we left and moved to Canada: a huge move for us all. We are now trying to start up again, remodel our lives and create our future for our family. I now feel like a tourist in the country of my birth, my eyes see different and my life will be forever changed. This blog is my notes and observations of our life, our changes, our adventures and new beginnings. Welcome.
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::Recent Entries::

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My Japanese Culture Teaching Notes

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Alisha - a site set up by friends and family of my little sis

Phrax - my step-brother

Blue Mountain Stable

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An Index of past posts - the Japan Years

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Thursday, September 15, 2005

A horse called Izzy

My dads place is a horse-boarding stable.
We went from a chicken farm to a horse farm. Quite the huge jump in animal size.
All three of us kids were involved with horses in one-way or the other. I had not yet found my greatest horse Rambler (note: Rambling Notes) but we were all in Pony Club and our parents were learning as much as we were.
My dad became the king of feeding. We pride ourselves with having some of the healthiest horses around. We have actually had vets recommend that their clients send their unhealthy horses to us.
We refer to our horses as our kids and brag about them as if they really were. Their owners are their parents. As with all parents you have good ones and bad ones.
We have had boarders ranging from the best of friends to the worst of enemies. We have had boarders that every barn owner dreams about having, to the ones that we all have nightmares about.
But we have also had the very interesting.

For some reason Izzy just popped into my head.

Izzy was a mixed bread horse from up country and his daddies name was Finnegan. No joke.

They moved down to the Valley to find work. Finnegan’s girlfriend was from one of the reserves in our area and he decided to head on down our way, and he of course had to bring his only kid with him, Izzy.
Through friends of friends he heard about us and brought Izzy to our place. Izzy was by far not the best looking horse I have ever seen, but he had a mischievous spark in his eye and he loved his daddy. And his daddy loved him. There was no doubting that these two had been through a lot together.
Finnegan had lived in the real up country, right in the middle of nowhere, and Izzy lived in a hundred acre field. We put him into one of the paddocks and he jumped the gate from a standing position. Our eyes popped out and we suddenly started having great respect for this unattractive horse.
Finnegan loved to talk about Izzy and would brag about how perfect he was. Once we got to know Izzy a little better we realized that Finnegan was actually telling the truth, Izzy was one fine horse.
One of my favorite stories was how when Finnegan wanted to head out to the bar for a night of drinking he would always ride Izzy instead of driving the truck. He would tie Izzy to the water pipe and go inside to party. When he was stumbling drunk Izzy was still there. Finnegan would find a drunken movie way to get his ass slung across Izzy’s back and Izzy would take him home.
Izzy always brought him right home; rain, snow or shine.
He was a true cowboys horse.
With a wintering of good food, spring showed us a good-looking animal. Even though he was not the most beautiful of creatures he was starting to shine. Finnegan would take Izzy out on weekend jaunts. After their first one we learned not to panic. It was quite common for them to leave early in the morning and not return until sometimes the next day. They both were tired but had had a great time doing what ever.
Izzy started to really grow on us and he was becoming a part of the family.
But times were not so great and Finnegan’s girlfriend convinced him to trade Izzy for a boat. Finnegan was not from fishing people, but she was, and they thought they might be able to make some money off of it.
You could tell that his was probably one of the toughest decisions that he had ever made in his life and it was killing him to do it.
On Izzy’s last day Finnegan took off with him early in the morning. They were gone the whole day. They came back late and dad was ready and prepared. Finnegan was not going to leave Izzy, so he got rip roaring drunk right there with his horse. After he passed out dad carried him into the clubroom to sleep it off.
The next day the boat owner showed up with a horse trailer and a spoiled little girl who fell off after only a few minutes.
Finnegan looked miserable.
Then they were gone.
It was over a year later when Finnegan showed up at the house with his girlfriend and her son. He just wanted to pat the horses. He and dad went for a boys talking walk in the horse field while I made small talk with his girlfriend and her son played tag with Leo, my brothers dog. (Literally played tag. The dog was perfect at it.)
They left and I have never seen him since.
Later dad told me that Finnegan said;
Getting rid of Izzy was the worst mistake of my life.

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Posted by (Top)Andrea::9/15/2005 :: 6 Comments:

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