Today I was having a rough day. Among other things I overslept and had to skip the coveted warm shower in exchange for throwing clothes on while running out the door, I did poorly on a test that I may or may not be able to improve my score on, and had to fight my huge art bag in winds that I swear were trying to make me become airborne. I also got all the way back to my apartment before realizing that I still had a couple errands to run at school. I was pissed by that point. On my way back to the art center I got myself my favorite coffee...just holding it and smelling the extra shot of espresso seemed to lift my spirits immensely. Then I hit another bump in the road...the teacher I was supposed to have a meeting with wasn't in his office....Grrrr...I was back on the warpath..must be the Blackfoot Indian running through my veins coming to the surface. I stomped myself to the computer lab and scowled at the screen as I logged on and loaded facebook. The first thing I see? Joshua James from Q104 offering free four packs of Renaissance Festival tickets. If we commented on the status he would pick four people to receive them at random. I thought well what the hell...worst thing that can happen is that I don't get them. I commented on the status...and I got them! I got a four pack of Ren Fest tickets :-D...I was excited...but the bad day wasnt totally gone yet. it was still lingering in the shadows waiting to show up in the form of my Windows programmed brain having to deal with the completely different animal that is called the Apple computer. I was muddling my way through getting things accomplished when I got to one part in my tasks that was to look up a good black and white photo of Sonora Webster diving one of her horses. That is when it happened. I got lost in the pictures and webpages dedicated to my very favorite part of history. The Diving Horse Show of the Steel Pier. Upon finding a handful of pictures I'd never seen before my heart remembered how much of inspiration the story is to me. My heart soared as I looked at picture after picture of Sonora and the other diving girls riding their horses off of the tower into the pool below. Some of the pictures of Sonora diving the horses were taken after she had gone blind. BLIND!!! Now THAT is a bad day!! But she didn't let that stop her!! She rode diving horses off of the tower into the pool below for ELEVEN YEARS AFTER an accident made her permanently blind!! I can't even put into an intelligent sentence how much that speaks to me. In fact in the past month I've drawn up a tattoo that I want to get that says "Never Be Afraid To Live Your Dreams". Someday maybe I'll write a book about Sonora and the history of the Steel Pier. Its definitely a book I'd enjoy writing. Anyway sorry this is long. I just had an awesome reminder that bad days aren't bad days if you are looking at them from atop a horse on a platform 60 feet in the air. Thank you, Sonora, for making it possible for my heart to soar off that platform with you and your horses. :-)
