Horses (a fun post!)
That still connects to Tolkien because Shadowfax!
We all need a fun/relax break from things these days.
I never watch the Superbowl (or any other sporting event), but I always watch (and often rewatch) the Clydesdale ads for the superbowl! This year was lovely (well, I say that about all of them, just as I say every cat and dog I meet is adorable, beautiful, etc. etc. etc. because they all are).
I love horses, and grew up with them: my mom grew up on a wheat farm in eastern Washington where they used horses for transport and fieldwork when she was growing up (she was a Depression-era baby); they did get farm machinery later, and she drove tractors and the trucks that took the wheat to town, but she loved horses. When she and my dad bought a place in the country (which was sort of looked down on by some of the other university people—my dad taught geology at the university—who preferred to live in the “better” part of town—she acquired horses! And sheep [well, that was grandpa, but still]. And bantam chickens. And dogs. And cats.)
And as long as she was doing the grocery shopping, the house beer was Budweiser (on the grounds of she wanted to make sure the Clydesdales got their oats)! I’ve been lucky enough to see the traveling group at a fair or two over the years—they are amazing.
Thinking of the Clydesdales and my mom (she died in 2018), I went through some digitized pictures from my childhood, and found some with me and horses. These were taken during the 1960s probably, then decades later, transferred to digital copies by my brother, so no promises as to quality!
All photography by Eileen Harris Reid.
My mom never got around to writing dates on the photos she took, so I’m guessing about that. I was probably 6-7 here; the horse is Camy (full name: Camelot)! This is in the pasture near our house, near our barn (and chickenhouse).
A few years later (color photography!), after my mom got my brother and me our own horses! My brother is in front, on Butch (the appaloosa), and I’m behind on Judy (looking back at the camera) (they came with those names). We are in the same pasture, but not near the barn—I can see my grandpa’s sheep there which dates it to probably 1963-4, so I’d have been about 8-9 years old. The location is northern Idaho; between Moscow and Troy (the road to the right is the Troy highway, and the large hill is Tomer Butte). Tolkien’s descriptions of the Shire remind me a great deal of the region where I grew up (the Palouse hills).
This one was a surprise: I had to stop and think! Since most of my friends also had horses, and visits with friends involved, yes, riding their horses! But looking at the background, and recognizing the smile of the rider in front, this was some time I visited my friend SB (I don’t like putting people’s names on the internet without their knowledge/permission!). Sadly, I don’t recall the horse’s name! That’s probably her mom in the background, and one of their cats.
We did learn how to use a saddle later on (after we got bigger) but learning by riding bareback or with just a surcingle was just fine—more than fine, really. And from early on, both my brother and I were helping with the chores that all those animals involved! I loved feeding the horses but cleaning the stalls (shoveling manure into a wheelbarrow and wheeling it out to the manure pile—luckily, they just had the stalls for feeding and to go in when they wanted so it could have been a lot more than it was) was not my favorite chore.
I was ten when I read LotR, and of course fell in love with Shadowfax! Although I thought it totally unfair that only the Kings of Rohan were allowed to ride the Mearas.
But that’s one reason fanfiction exists (to “fix” the story), so I wrote a fic (NOT quite finished—life interfered with plans) where Morwen (Boromir and Éowyn’s daughter) has her own partner, Scimasæ, and she (YES, SHE!!!) is the horse of my dreams: White Flower, White Tree (warning: it’s a rather dark AU for much of the story, but then things change—and the last couple of installments will be a happy ending, when I’m able to finish it!).
When I read (I forget where it was — maybe John Garth’s book Tolkien and the Great War,) that one of Tolkien’s job in WWI was training the horses, I was amazed but not surprised.
Any other horse fans out there?
Yes! Grew up with Morgans and now have retired with Morgans. One delight of Tolkien's writing is that he gets the horses right, or if they do something fantastical there is a reason for it.
Yes, another horse lover here! I was especially obsessed as a little girl. I used to check out books of breeds from the library and sit on the floor and copy the pictures. Growing up in Hawaii, it was a little challenging to be around actual horses often but I was able to have riding lessons for a short time in middle school. Very fun to see these pictures. Also, shoutout to the “Horse Girls of Middle-earth” episode of Queer Lodgings podcast, that was a fun one.