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As observant as a turnip
When it comes to non-critical things, I am not the most observant person in the world. When I was in high school, someone asked me if my brother had gotten his braces off. I said I didn’t think he ever had braces. My best friend slapped me upside the head and told me he had, and they’d come off a week before. I’m sure I knew all of this on some level, but it wasn’t mission critical to my life, so it hadn’t really sunk in as something I needed to remember.
So, when I got out to the barn today, I did the usual critical checks: horse outside? Yes. Trainer in the indoor? No—must be at the dressage ring. I went into the paddock to get the horse, reflexively looked down to check his legs (habit from the Super Saint), and nearly had a heart attack. It looked like the legs had been severely scraped up, and then copious amounts of green medicine applied.
I had a major deadline at work on Friday, with several more in the upcoming weeks, so I hadn’t been at the barn much this week and I hadn’t had my cell phone on, either. I was sure his owner had been in touch with me about whatever this was, but I hadn’t gotten the message.
And then, as I kept staring at his leg, I realized a fly was crawling all over it and he clearly didn’t care. He was busy trying to find out why I was holding a halter and not putting it on him. I bent down to see what was happening, and realized it wasn’t wounds and medication at all—it was paint.
Oh, right. Halloween.
I forgot about Halloween. Really. On my way home from work Friday night, I remembered long enough to swing by the store and pick up some candy (total failure—all they had left were Reeces, and I wouldn’t subject Reeces on anyone. I abhor that candy). But no trick or treaters came by, so I settled back in to work some more and… forgot.
Rogue’s owner told me 6,000 times that her kid was decorating Rogue for Halloween. I even talked with her kid earlier in the week. But it completely escaped my mind.
And to make things worse, once I realized it was just paint on his legs and looked over the rest of him, I realized there was paint all over him. You’d have to be a blind bat to miss it. So even given that I’d forgotten about Halloween, I should have seen all the other decorations before I saw his leg and had a minor heart attack.
Good grief. I know there is medication to help ADHD people focus; surely there’s medication to help people like me become more observant?
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