This was a delightful little day spent at the barn walking, thinking, connecting, and riding horses. Max, Mel, and Bill are all incredibly different, special, intelligent half-ton weirdos. I can’t wait for you to meet them.

Photographed above is Mel, a charming and sweet and boisterous 8-year-old Arabian gelding. Before settling down enough to take this photo, he had just shimmied his nose in the dirt, snorted and bounced his way down the hill, and leapt around the growing pasture — all while I walked beside him, a 6-foot lead-rope between us.

Allowing myself to slow down, breathe in the fresh air alongside Mel, and watch him voraciously chomp on grass, inquisitively spook at the sound of a nearby stream, and spin around in nature-inspired bliss, I was reminded of the authenticity of here and now. Being present.