Horse Birthdays and Races, Racehorses Update, and 'Humble Pie'!

This photo was (obviously!) taken when we had lush pasture. We're looking forward to spring! (Thanks, Bill, for this great pic!).

I'm a Cheetah (left) has a birthday on March 30. She will be 23.

Lions Raw (her mother, right) has a birthday on March 27. She will be 29.

They both live on our farm.

If you couldn't come to my book launch (Love and Death) you can find the video clip we showed of Lions Raw when she was a foal, in my November 25 blog post, and also her first race: which she won!

Just to show you what a great racehorse Lions Raw was, here's a race from 1999. The quality is poor, but you'll see how well she does. She is no. 3 and has a white flash and a white noseband. We were very proud of her racing career and her broodmare success.

And this is I'm a Cheetah's very first race. She was only two. She is no. 4.

And now a story after which there's a brief update on the three racehorses we part-own.

'Humble Pie' is my most recent story. It's a 'word challenge' piece written for the Uxbridge Writers' Circle. The words I had to use are in italics.

Humble Pie

It was difficult for Polly to reach into the brambles without her sweater catching on the thorns. But she was determined to pick enough blackberries to make a blackberry apple pie. It would be a well-deserved treat that she hadn’t enjoyed since arriving in Canada about twelve months ago.

Jeremy and Rowena thought it was madness to pick blackberries yourself when they could so easily be bought at the supermarket. But Polly didn’t want Mexican ones that were days old. She wanted fresh, sweet Canadian ones from the hedgerows.

She was looking forward to making and eating the pie, even though she’d be playing gooseberry with Jeremy and Rowena that evening.

She’d met Rowena at a writing course held in the local library. Rowena ran one of the break-out workshops. Rowena knew all the rules of writing, including structure, outlining, plot, number of chapters, length of chapters, ‘show not tell’, length of story, present or past tense, length of book, point of view, and so many more. At first, Polly appreciated Rowena’s guidance and instruction, but then it struck. Paralysis. She’d not faced writer’s block before. Her problem was usually one of writing far too much and having to edit ruthlessly in order to reach a sensible word count.

And then she met Jeremy. He was a published author and believed he knew even more than his wife. He offered to read some of Polly’s work. He edited it with thick blue ink and even inserted red exclamation marks and made suggestions in green. Her pages looked like rainbow wrapping paper by the time he’d finished with them.

Polly had been a successful freelance writer in England but now was a pathetic, insecure, dithering, wordless want-to-be writer, staring at a blank computer screen mesmerized by a flashing cursor.

Why, then, was Polly making a blackberry apple pie to eat with Jeremy and Rowena?

It all changed while she was enjoying a Caesar salad in Len’s Bistro. Len was bored. There wasn’t much happening that day. It was a rainy Monday and nobody was about. He sat at a table next to Polly’s and they got chatting. Well, he talked, and she listened while eating her delicious salad. Len knew how to prepare food.

Len told her how his previous partners in a restaurant they jointly owned had dominated him. They demotivated him by dismissing his values and skills, insisting that their culinary style was the only way. Their rules suffocated his creativity, and he lost the feel, as well as the passion, for his work. He suffered. He felt defeated and a failure.

Polly had previously shared her struggle with writer's block, and while she’d made light of Jeremy and Rowena’s negative influence, she said enough for Len to figure out there were some parallels to what he’d been through.

He’d been close to giving up the career he loved and sensed that the same thing could happen to Polly.

He told her it was as if there’d been a straw hovering over him, just like the one about to land on the camel’s back and, if he allowed it to settle on him, it would mean the end of his career as a chef. But the realization that he was close to folding under the pressure of his partners—whose goal was to squeeze him out on the cheap—shook some sense into him. So, he came up with a plan.

On Monday evenings the partners would develop or improve recipes for the restaurant and hold a tasting. Len said he dreaded these evenings because his dishes were demeaned and even ridiculed. To make it worse, his attempts became more and more feeble as the bullying intensified. But he saw that the tastings gave him an opportunity to act. He used his expertise in mushroom varieties to develop a poisonous powder using fungi he’d harvested locally. He sprinkled some on his dish for them to taste and the usual derisive criticism followed.

He received a text in the morning to say neither of them would be in the restaurant because they were both sick. Was he okay? Did he eat the same food they did? (He’d made sure to dispose of the food so that it couldn’t be tested).

Len seized the opportunity and called the toughest restaurant reviewer he knew of and invited her to come at any time during the next three days. The feedback from customers was enough for him, but he wanted these partners to stop their attacks. And he needed independent validation for his own sake.

The reviewer came and her glowing review was published.

Polly wanted to know if the partners recovered. Len was a bit irritated by her question but said they were fine, and he received a fair price for his part of the restaurant which meant he could set up his own bistro.

Polly asked him why he’d told her his story of revenge and he simply said, ‘think about it’.

She stepped out of the bistro into the dreary drizzle and walked back to her small apartment above the independent bookstore. She stood gazing into the window wondering if she’d ever finish her novel and see it displayed there. The owner had asked her several times how it was progressing.

Polly did what Len suggested and thought about what he’d said. She wasn’t seeking revenge but wanted to return to writing with confidence and enjoyment.

While she saw as little as possible of Rowena and Jeremy, their paths crossed in the writing community, and their negative influence continued to play havoc.

Writing was intrinsic to Polly’s enjoyment of life, so she knew she must free herself from the black cloud of self-doubt fueled by their criticism.

She came up with an idea, although it was a long shot. Ironically, Rowena had emailed fellow writers about an upcoming story competition. It would be tough, but each entrant would receive one or two lines of comment from the judges, which provided a great learning experience and, Polly hoped, would restore at least some of her self-assuredness.

She poured a glass of smooth cabernet merlot, turned on her laptop and searched for a story she’d written while in England. It took her two hours of editing to polish her writing and five minutes to summon up enough courage to submit her story.

Len was right, you had to do something.

And it paid off.

She wasn’t about to poison Rowena and Jeremy with her blackberry apple pie, but she was going to announce that she’d just heard she’d won the story competition. Not only would she receive a substantial financial award, but the story would be published in three magazines, and she was invited to read it on national radio during their book club program.

So, Polly was making humble pie for Rowena and Jeremy to eat, and she was finally able to make that flashing cursor move and fill the blank pages.

Vicky Earle Copyright 2025

PS Do you think Len's partners survived the poisoning?

Update on racehorses

All three have arrived safely at Woodbine Racetrack.

Prized Spirit (Mimi) is being reintroduced to training slowly because she sustained an injury at the end of last year.

Audi's World (Audi) is keen to do more work. He got a bit frustrated with being ridden in the riding arena (see previous post for video clips) although his most recent rides were outside in a riding ring before he left for Woodbine.

Rizzmo (Toby) is only two years old so he won't be rushed. He needs time to develop mentally and physically.

We hope to see all three of them soon and I plan to post some pics in my next post.

Thank you for reading my post.

Please share.

Vicky