Keep moving forward

I haven't been on this blog since Roy's death ten days ago.  I was thinking that I should, but then I kept not doing so.  I couldn't have written anything better than Emma's tribute to him on the website.  And even if I could add something to that, I still wouldn't have been able to do what I really wanted to do, which was to turn the clock back.  We can never do that.  All we can do is keep going forward.  We can't make the sun, both real and metaphorical, shine every day; we just have to learn to smile in the rain, hard though that can be.  We all have an allotted time on this earth, man and beast, and all we can do is to try to make as good use of that limited time as possible, to get the most out of life and try to make the world a better place, bring joy to those around us.  Roy certainly did that.  It's just a crying shame that he couldn't have done so for another 15 years or so.

Of course, any such reflections have already been overtaken by events, as they always are.  We haven't been the only people mourning a loved horse, not least because another of the most charismatic horses in the British Isles, Presenting Percy, passed away a few days later.  But these have all been put completely in the shade by the dreadful news today of Lorna Brooke's death.  I never met her but, having read about her in recent days, I wish that I had done so.  She clearly made the best use of her allotted time, got the most out of her life, brought joy to those around her and made the world a better place.  One can't do more than that, but again it's just so desperately sad that she couldn't have done so for another few decades.  I can only imagine the grief that her family and friends are suffering now.  I'm crying writing this and I never knew her.

We'll keep moving forward, though.  We have to.  Furthermore, over the past ten days, the heaviness of doing so has been hugely eased by the overwhelming kindness of so many people whose kind words and thoughts about Roy have been hugely appreciated.  I thank them/you all from the bottom of my heart.  I was pleased not to be going to the races last week, but I'm going to Yarmouth tomorrow and, as if to prove that hope does indeed spring eternal in the human breast, I'm looking forward to that.  Turn Of Phrase runs there, and the thought of taking a nice, kind horse to a pleasant racecourse on a sunny day certainly buoys the spirits.