Of Dragons and Horses

Of Dragons and Horses

Christina Weigand

Would you believe that with all my talks of dragons that I did not come to my acquaintance with them until adulthood.  I knew of dragons of course. I remember listening to the song; Puff the Magic Dragon on my little record player hundreds of times. One thing that did attract my attention was horses (it seems that a good many people shared this fascination with me). I was all about horses. I loved horse books and my favorite author was Marguerite Henry and her tales of the Chincoteague ponies, Justin Morgan Had a Horse, and of course Black Gold. I would read these books over and over again.

I begged my father to get us a pony until he finally relented and got us one. It was then that I realized I was fascinated with the idea of owning a horse but not so much with actually owning a horse. Bobby, the pony was a lot of work that I didn’t so much enjoy.

So after several years of not taking care of the pony my dad finally gave him away. I can only hope it was to a child who would love and care for him more than I did.

So another one of my passions was writing. Even as a young child I remember sitting at the dining room table and pretending I owned a greeting card company where I would come up with little sayings to put inside the cards. Around Middle school time I began to write more. I took a creative writing class and even thought about being a journalist only after I was disabused of the desire to be a nurse.

Ah yes, I had many dreams as a child, not many of them came to fruition as I learned the facts about each of my dreams, like nursing involved blood and icky stuff that I didn’t think I could handle. I saw the movie Jaws when it was released and had nightmares as well as fearing going to sleep. It was then that I decided that nursing was not something I wanted to pursue, even though it had been a dream of mine for several years. Once again I think it was the pamphlets about nursing schools and the cute little white caps that nurses got to wear that was the appeal instead of the actual nursing.

Of course when I met my husband while still in high school and fell in love most of my dreams were put aside for the thought of being married to him and raising a family. It wasn’t until we were many years into our marriage that I took up my writing again and that even came after another of what I thought had been a childhood dream was quashed. Still no dragons entered my life.

It wasn’t until about sixteen years ago that the first of my dragons came on the scene. The first one Tatsu has turned out to be not such a nice dragon, but not long after Myrria came along and my fascination with dragons blossomed.

When I think about the sense of wonder and the attitude that comes with it, I think with my dragons and my writing I have been able to resurrect some of those feelings. My books are a testament to that wonder. I am ecstatic that I have been able to return to those childhood dreams and make them a part of my adulthood.

And I still love horses and like to ride, but having one to own is not a desire. Someone else can do the owning. Nursing is definitely no longer a dream, but I have spent thirty nine years nursing and nurturing my children and my grandchildren. So even though I don’t have the cute cap (which I don’t think many nurses wear nowadays) nursing is another dream that came true, just not in the way I first thought it would.

In my humble opinion those childhood dreams that we all have are the fuel that warms our adult lives and even though they may not appear to come true, in some form or another they do come to fruition.

So don’t ignore those horses and dragons, those greeting card games or even the nursing dreams. Instead encourage them, feed them, let them grow, because you never know what they will blossom into.