Reunion at the Barn

After all my own children were in school, I started my teaching career and taught twenty years before retiring. Some of my former students have remained in contact over time, including Angelina, who just graduated from high school.

Angelina is a fellow horse lover. A year or so after leaving elementary school, she visited me while in middle school. She was very comfortable being in the middle of all the horses and happily fed carrots and peppermints to them all.

When I retired in 2018, Angelina came to the surprise retirement party that a bunch of my former students planned for me and held in my classroom at the end of the day.

 That's Angelina standing on the right with other classmates that just graduated this year.

She and I had been texting recently about her post graduation plans and I asked if she'd like to come see the horses again.

 Angelina was thrilled about that! She hopes to own a horse herself some day.

After some hugs and tears, we headed out into the pasture to visit the herd.

 She found Hokey's favorite spot - he was so happy!

 Although she did have to prove to him that she did not have any treats left.

 Hokey is a sweet boy and he enjoyed having all of Angelina's attention. (Look how loose his lips are - that boy is in heaven!)

 We toured the new barn and Tim's wagon collection...

... and then we sat outside on the hay wagon and chatted. I wanted to hear about her plans (going to Purdue to study Biology), hear how her family was (stepmom is undergoing cancer treatment so we made sure we wore masks while we were together), and we just generally caught up on each other's lives.

She also baked me the YUMMIEST cookies! And packed them in a pretty box with a gold ribbon!

The biggest treat, though, was not the cookies or the horses. It was the opportunity to reunite with a young woman that I've known for many years and love very much.