Ever since I was a little girl, my daddy made sure I could take care of myself. The very first time I ever drove by myself, my dad was in the passenger seat of our big Chevy pick-up truck and I pulled the horse trailer down a gravel road to a friend’s house. By the time I was 16, I was hauling my horse by myself to different barrel racings and rodeos.
Boy did all that practice driving the truck and trailer come in handy the weekend before Thanksgiving. There was a polocrosse playday in Castroville and no one from the Stewart Polocrosse crew was going. Oops (the Stewart polocrosse horse I ride) and I had been doing a lot of practicing and we really wanted to go; so I dusted off my trusty horse trailer, washed my truck, and started packing everything up.
A couple of years ago, my dad renovated the front tack room of our horse trailer into semi-living quarters. There are lots of cabinets with everything you might need for camping, a propane heater to help keep you warm, and all of the inside is insulated. It was the perfect place to sleep for the weekend.
On Friday afternoon, I loaded up my horse and my dog, checked all my tires for air, put some country tunes on the radio, and headed off to Castroville. Going alone to this playday gave me such a feeling of independence. Even though I love it when we all load up together in Jeeper’s truck and trailer, it was a great feeling to know that I didn’t have to rely on other people to get my horse places.
Walking into the line-up to start our match.
What a great weekend Oops and I had in Castroville. It was a very small group of people and it gave me the chance to really get to know some of the people that I see all the time at polocrosse events. It’s such a great little community that we have. All of the higher ranked players really used the weekend to coach us lower ranked riders. I received so much encouragement over the weekend. I am pretty sure we were all smiling so big during all of our chukkas.
One of the best parts was getting to see Brooks Royer and Julia Willis. Brooks helped me to teach polocrosse here at Heart during second term and Julia was, of course, our head of horseback this summer. Brooks came in with a group from Houston to play for the weekend. Julia and her mom Renee came out on Sunday to watch a little bit of the action. It’s always so great to share your passions with others.
Brooks and I ready to play polocrosse
Julia and Felix ready to watch some polocrosse action!
Overall it was a very successful weekend filled with lots of friendship and fun! Polocrosse weekends always promise to be exciting and I can’t wait to travel to more!
Love from The Heart,
<3 Meghan
About the Author
