The Power of Dreams by Sarah Madison
My guest today is the amazing Sarah Madison! Not only is she a contributor to my Olympics anthology, in which she writes about two men who are passionate about Three-Day Eventing and each other, but she’s an accomplished equestrienne herself. Read on to find out why you don’t want to miss her story “Lightning in a Bottle.”
You know, not everyone has the ability to turn dreams into reality. Most of the time, no matter how badly we want something, it doesn’t materialize. Sometimes, we don’t have the resources, time, or the talent to achieve our dreams. Face it; if you want to be an Olympic gymnast and you’re built like a runway model, well, it’s not likely to happen.
But in truth, most of us give up. Once, one of my friends seriously pissed me off by telling me that I must not have wanted to be an actress badly enough because I gave up on the idea when I entered college. I’d been heavily involved in theater in high school, winning every award possible and performing in eleven plays in three years. It wasn’t a matter of not wanting it badly enough, I told her. I was being realistic. I was a big fish in an extremely small pond. I knew that high school talent didn’t translate to a career on the stage, and that I wasn’t pretty enough for Hollywood.
You must not have wanted it badly enough.
Those words burned within me. No, I insisted. I wanted it, very much so, but I was being smart. I knew I didn’t have what it took, that I wouldn’t have been able to deal with the constant rejection, an industry so weighted on appearances, the forever-scrabble between jobs to make ends meet. I put my dreams of being an actress behind me when I graduated, and I returned to my earlier interests of animals again. I worked very hard to achieve my new goals, and though the odds were stacked against me, I succeeded in getting my degree and entering my profession of choice.
But my thoughts kept coming back to my friend’s words.
I was one of those horse-mad girls as a child. Despite living in the suburbs with no access to a stable, I collected model horses, I watched every horse-related event on television, and I wallowed in the horse stories of my childhood. The Black Stallion. Summer Pony. Misty of Chincoteague. I wrote a highly popular serial (at least among my friends) starring young girls solving Nancy Drew-like mysteries out of a stable. My parents used to jokingly say that if they only got me a pony, they would never have to set an alarm clock for me again because on riding days, I was up when the first pink streaks of dawn painted the sky, doing my chores so I would be ready to go to the barn. I rode my bicycle five miles each way to get to the barn after school, where I earned rides in exchange for cleaning stalls. I caught rides when I could, sometimes going months without riding at all, while my friends took lessons weekly and showed their ponies on the weekends.
I finally realized that though my parents spoke frequently of buying a farm, getting me a horse, and settling down to raise German Shepherds, this was never going to happen. While in college, I bought my first horse for eighty-nine cents a pound, and got my first German Shepherd shortly afterward. I still have that first horse, by the way. He’s retired now. At twenty-seven, he’s having trouble keeping weight on and is gimpy with arthritis, but he will always and forever be my first horse.
I was once told by an instructor that I was a terrible rider and I had no business ever getting on a horse again. If I’d had enough confidence at the time, I would have told her that if she was any kind of instructor, she could teach even me. Instead, I took her words to heart, and for almost a year, I didn’t ride at all. Still, I couldn’t stay away, and found myself hanging around barns again.
I went to the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games specifically to watch the equestrian events in Conyers, GA. Sure, I knew I was never going to ride at that level. I knew with the demands of my profession, I couldn’t even compete extensively in the local circuit. It was enough for me to go to one or two events a year–and have my competition curse because I’d just threatened their chances of winning that day. When I heard that MLR Press was looking for stories for an Olympic themed anthology, my sport horse story practically wrote itself.
My sport horse horse was purposely bred for my sport of choice, eventing. It’s an intense sport often referred to as the triathlon of horse sports because of the three difficult phases: dressage, cross-country, and stadium (or ‘show’) jumping. Each phase requires very different skills and abilities to perform them. It is challenging to find a horse that can do all three well, even with diligent training.
I chose my mare’s parents. I was there every moment of her life, from conception to the time she first appeared on the ultrasound screen to the moment of her birth. She is the child I will never have. Though I have not been able to compete her as I’d hoped, I am still riding her, despite a severe car accident and long stretches of time off due to life events for both of us over which I had no control. I was told after the accident to give up riding; that I would never be able to do so pain-free and that I would make things worse for myself.
Screw that, I thought.
I continued to ride through pain that stabbed with every breath. Over time, the pain lessened, and eventually it became something I could manage. I rode even though I had no hope of every being any good at it. I rode when everyone told me to quit, when I couldn’t afford it, when people made fun of my meat-market horse. At the end of his final competition before his retirement, he was the reserve champion in his division that day, proving that sometimes, sheer hard work can beat out natural, but undisciplined, ability.
It occurred to me recently that I’ve had the same push-me pull-you relationship with writing. I wrote frequently as a child. I reveled in fanfic as a teenager. But somewhere along the way, I decided I needed to put aside the childish things of my youth, and writing was one of them. It was only as an adult, when I was introduced to some characters that I fell in love with, that the urge to write became irresistible again. The next thing I knew twenty years of repressed creativity came burgeoning out of me. I had no choice but to write. It would not leave me alone. If you’d asked me as a teenager if I wanted be a writer when I grew up, I would have said no because I wouldn’t have believed in myself enough to pursue that treasured goal. But deep down, that desire to be a writer lay dormant under a frost-covered field. It might have taken twenty years for spring to arrive, but it came in the end.
I realized the other day that my friend was right. If you give up on your dream, it’s because you didn’t want it badly enough. Because the want is not an active thing that you pursue. No, it’s the other way around. It’s a drive that compels you. You simply have no choice. You might take a long hiatus, pretend you’ve moved on, tell yourself that you’ve given up your foolish dreams, but if you cave in to the voice of self-doubt permanently, you really didn’t want it badly enough.
Sarah Madison is a veterinarian, a horsewoman, the owner of a large dog, and a writer of M/M romance. Her latest novella, Lightning in a Bottle, is part of the Olympic themed anthology, Going for Gold, to be released by MLR Press on August 31, 2012. She draws upon her lifelong love of horses and her competition history to tell this story of the dangerous and exciting equine sport of eventing. You can find her stories at SarahMadisonFiction.com
Get Going for Gold at MLR Press
Add to your Goodreads bookshelf!
4 Responses to “The Power of Dreams by Sarah Madison”
Leave a Reply
Interesting how life happens when we’re being realistic, isn’t it?
I can relate to the “practical career” thing, and the writing as a kid thing.
I loved horses as a kid, and have had a few over the years–still have one, hay burner that he is.
I love the picture of the colt/filly.
I do think things happen for a reason–if I hadn’t made the life choices that I had, I might not have been in the position to be one of my dad’s caretakers in the end (and thus have missed out on getting to know my father for the first time in our busy lives).
My only regret is that I wasn’t writing all along–if I had, I’d probably be much better at it by now. 🙂
I loved your story – I too dreamed of a horse of my own, but never took that step. (I was almost certainly a worse rider than you ever were.) There is something special about just being around horses, though, and that came through in the story. Not just the feelings of the men for each other, but the way the horses and riding were deep in their bones and essential to the way they wanted to live. The horses were characters in their own right, one with talent be begrudging in his responses, the other generous but green and untried. You brought it all to life.
Thank you! The horses *do* have their own distinct personalities and there is something about the bond between you and your horse that transcends explanation. I’m so glad that came through for you in the story!
It was one of the things that made this story so easy for me to write–the words just flowed out of me (and flowed, and flowed–the final word count surprised me a bit!).