In the midst of my europe/what will I do with my life musings, I also have this perfectly lovely life here in Washington DC that I like to express my adoration of as well.  I think this weekend was the first time that I have been truly grateful to be here, and not pining to be somewhere else, in a very long time.  Friday, I went and rode the new horse that I am leasing.  His name is Murphy, he's a little Halflinger guy who lives next to Manassas Battlefield about 35 minutes from where we live.  We've had a really good time together, and Friday we were able to tag along for a great 8 mile ride around the battlefield with a couple of ladies who use his stable as a "staging area", or a place to trailer to and then hit the trails.  We forded deep streams, galloped across the open fields, and jumped logs to our heart's content.  It was utterly euphoric. 

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After I groomed Murph and got him put away for the night, I drove out to this little town called Warrenton, which has about a half a dozen tack stores according to the internet, and as I came to find out, the home of John Marshall, the great American Statesman and Chief Justice. 


(taken on my camera phone, it's really much prettier than this!)

It does indeed have a lot of tack stores, plus the town is so crazy charming that I stayed late into the day.  The tack stores there are very different from anything I'm used to- they are mainly focused on upper class fox hunters, which the area is famous for (I had NO idea this was the case).  So you walk in expecting to find a hodge podge of feed and blankets and breeches, and instead find a hodge podge of fox canes, giant ladies hats, european antique furniture, and approxamately 1,945,388 pieces of horse equipment I have NEVER seen before.  Is it possible I consider myself a horse expert, and yet have been mistakenly under the impression that foxhunting was an obsolete pastime?  

nonetheless, it was a huge riot to go in there and check it all out.  I was hoping to find a pair of cheap riding tights in Warrenton (BAAAAHHHHAHAHAHA)  but instead walked out of "Horse Country Tack" with a book on the Horse History of Northern Virginia in hopes of learning a bit more of all this highfalootin fox huntin' bizniss I been missin. 

I had a lovely but still calorie conscious peach & grilled chicken salad at the Irish Pub in town, and then watched as the fine folks of Warrenton setup for the 100 year anniversary of their Volunteer Fire Department. It is crazy to me that places like this actually exist.

This is the good part.  An hour later, I was home and running out the door again to meet two of my old friends from college, Maryam and Shadi, who are in Washington DC for the holiday weekend.  Where one moment I had just been in reach of the blue mist of the Shenendoahs, the very next I was getting off the metro in downtown Washington DC to escort the girls around the National Mall.  That same body that had been racing up hills on horseback could be leaning back against the cold granite of the Washington Memorial in one day, all without a real care in the world. 



On the actual Independence Saturday, I broke into my old wretched apartments to use their pool as a means of getting my money's worth til the day I leave the Old Dominion, got burnt silly, had a barbeque, and then went with good old friends to the Jefferson Memorial to watch the fireworks fly over the water, above the Washington.  It was positively lovely, and getting home on the metro wasn't so bad either. 



There is so much to keep me satisfied here forever, I'm afraid to muss with it too much now!

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