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In reply to the discussion: Seems like I have some fences to mend [sorry, long!] [View all]magical thyme
(14,881 posts)She yelled at me loudly, "DO NOT EVER SAY THAT YOU ARE LUCKY! YOU ARE NOT LUCKY, YOU WORK HARD!!!!!! YOUR BIRDS ARE SWEET BECAUSE YOU FEED THEM A GOOD DIET AND YOU HANDLE THEM CORRECTLY! THAT IS NOT LUCK; THAT IS WORK! DON'T EVER LET PEOPLE TELL YOU THAT YOU ARE LUCKY!"
I was shocked by her tone, but remain so grateful to her for saying that to me. All my life, my parents complained one thing or another was "unfair" that I was "lucky," and made me give much of what came my way to my sisters. The fact is, I worked hard for what came my way, and they did not. I didn't get good grades because I was "lucky." I got good grades because I studied. I didn't progress in riding because I was "lucky." I progressed because I worked hard at it and studied.
I've worked hard and sacrificed much to have my pony. I've worked harder than I ever could imagine. After saving for decades, when I first bought my mini-farm, I hired a contractor to fix the pasture entry, and instead he tried to steal my topsoil and trashed the place. I was going to buy a pre-fab barn, but now I had no way to bring it in. A lot of people would have given up. But I hand-carried in the lumber to build my barn, and I learned to use power tools to build it, and brought my horse home in time for Christmas.
I did pay to have the roadside fencing professionally installed, because we live on a very busy road with high speed trucks whizzing through. But all the interior fencing I installed myself. That was hard, hard labor.
I had to sell my rider mower to pay for a semester of school. I couldn't get the lawn guy to bush-hog this year. So I have been doing the fence-line and overgrown areas by hand, using loppers. I've painstakingly cleared about half of what got overgrown that way. The rest I will do with my new scythe. It helps to have the right tools.