Miss Horse

I have been mindlessly entering data on the computer and sorting mountains of photos. I decide to take a break and look through my books so I can put them up on Alibris. I randomly picked , Since You Went Away by Margaret Buell Wilder. Part of listing a book is to leaf through it and check its condition, read a bit so I can describe it and . . . that's when I read this passage:

I . . . got on Miss Horse. She felt limber and hot under the saddle, not the way she feels on cold winter mornings with a hump in her back, but pliable, bending this way and that with your knees. The soft little wind suddenly became taut against my face and the sun brighter. It was like sailing, settling down in the saddle, letting her out in great bounds across the flat polo field. Then we found some jumps behind the club and she went at them, snatching at the bit a little and not changing her stride, but just pouring over, as if she'd been tipped out of a jug. It was so smooth and light I didn't even feel when she took off or when she landed; it was lovelier rhythm than even flying could be . . .

It is a novel of a woman's letters to her husband during WWII. Its rough going and finances are hard but she decides she can't give up her horse, her sanity and her daughters dream. Well, now I'm going to have to read it before I sell it.