I'm curious to know if anyone had a childhood dream that didn't come true until much later in life. I'd like to hear about yours.
I will start it off by telling my story.
When I was seven or eight, I was 'horse crazy.' (Still am!) I came from a poor farm family, but more than anything else I wanted a black Shetland pony with a long and shaggy black mane and tail. I remember telling Santa what I wanted that year, my first time ever sitting on his lap, but I was desperate.
I was the youngest of five children and the only girl. My father was a sharecropper and we lived in a converted chicken coop with one bedroom, a kitchen, and a living room. We had an outhouse for a toilet. My father farmed the land, and we raised cows and chickens for milk, eggs, and meat. No way 'Santa' would ever consent to us owning an animal we couldn't eat, especially one that required hay and grain, not to mention we had no money to buy a pony. Needless to say, Santa brought me a stocking filled with apples, oranges, and peppermint sticks, but no pony that year.
The years went by and we moved from the converted chicken coop into a house with three bedrooms and an indoor toilet, our first ever. We had five acres of land my dad farmed and we again had farm animals, but no black pony.
More years went by. I finished school and college, married, and had a child of my own. My husband and I had no room for a pony, but I never stopped thinking about that black one.
Twenty-one years ago we bought a thirty-acre farm. Did I get that black pony? No. We were both too busy with life. Yes, we had the land and I still dreamed about that pony I so desperately wanted, but it just didn't happen.
I've always been an animal rights activist, so in 2005 I decided to take in an abused horse that someone had almost starved to death. I nursed him back to health and watched him flourish. One equine led to another, to another. Still no black pony, but a stable full of horses that were in need of a safe harbor to call their own. We decided to open our farm and become a certified Animal Sanctuary.
Then it happened. Since we are registered in the state of Georgia as an animal rescue, I got a call in 2015 from the Dept. of Agriculture asking if I could take in an abused pony. Without even asking the color, I said yes. Lo and behold, as soon as the trailer door opened, out stepped the most gorgeous black Shetland pony I'd ever seen, long flowing mane and tale. Neglected and in need of tender loving care, I nursed that sweet girl back to health, and there she was. My dream came true. It took over fifty years for it to happen, but it did.
She's everything I dreamed of and more. Her name is Fancy, fitting for such a prim and proper little lady. Trust me, she was worth the wait!
