In my next life, I may be a cowgirl.

When I was growing up, I loved horses. I'm not quite sure the word "love" adequately describes how I felt - I lived them, breathed them, dreamed them. Except wait. My dad was a pharmacist. We lived on the top of a mountain, full of lovely trees and winding forest paths, but no pastures, no barns, no place to house a horse. So for the first nine years of my life, I loved from a distance.

And then, miracle of all miracles, when I was in the fourth grade, my parents signed me up for horseback riding lessons. And suddenly, I had found my destiny. I lived for Wednesday afternoons when I ventured out to the stables and spent fifty minutes doing the one thing in life I loved the most. I kept it up all through my remaining years of elementary school and on into middle school, even riding a bit through high school, though I must admit, when other extra curricular sports and activities filled my schedule I didn't have time to ride as much. I picked it back up in college though and loved every minute of it.

Since then, I haven't spent much time with horses. In my frequent state of pregnancy (not now, just a lot in the past eight years) or new mommyness, there didn't seem to be much time or money to accommodate such a hobby. I can dream though, and I do still dream of farm life. And not just for the horses. Oh, how I would love a few acres - not so much that I need help to run it all. Just enough for a BIG vegetable garden and a row of apple trees. Blueberries, blackberries and raspberries grow everywhere in this part of the country... I would need some of those as well.

And chickens. Really. I would love it. Everyone tells me they stink, but they don't have to live RIGHT next to the house, do they?

A pair of horses would be lovely, and considering the rate at which we steam through a gallon of milk in this house, I might ought to invest in a cow as well.

Okay. Perhaps a cow is pushing it. But seriously. I think somewhere inside of me there is a farm girl just dying to come out.

And now because I'm all about embarrassing myself, and, so you know my desires for farm life started many, many years ago, a page from my journal, dated January 5, 1992. It's okay to laugh. I was 11.

My fantasy: I own a Mercedes (off to a good start) and a truck and trailer. I have a wild band of horses that has 1 stallion and 60 mares. The mares usually will have many young colts or fillys running around. (guess I understood the need for a stallion... but 60 mares? He stayed busy.) I tame them on occasion and use them for showing and racing. On very rare occasion, I use them for work around the farm. I have a large farm with a huge barn. I have all kinds of horses and have never in my life have hurt a horse. (I left in my bad grammer for authenticity.) I am married and have ten kids. (holy smokes... don't hold me to this!) I majored in veterinary science at N.C. State (Oh! Make my Carolina blue blood boil!)  and do a lot of traveling around town to work on hurt or sick animals. I own many famous horses that travel all over the world to compete in world wide competitions. I own four dogs, two German Shepherds, and two Russian Wolfhounds. They have puppies often and my kids earn money by selling young puppies to wonderful homes. (how sweet of me to let the kids have the money.) I have around 25 barn cats who take care of the mice, and ten barn bunnies. (What?) The barn bunnies are used to comfort the horses during hard times. (WHAT?!?) Each one of my kids has their own horse and their own bunny. This is only a dream but I hope it comes true someday.