I love horses. Like really, really love horses. Since I can remember… There’s a picture of me at about 9 months old perched atop a large grey horse at a farm in upstate New York, my proud mother holding onto me, and that picture has been ingrained in my mind for all of these years. Although I may not actually remember that crisp fall day, I just know that that’s where it all began.

For summer after summer, all through my youth, I went to riding camp. I was good, too. Aggressive. Always got to ride the biggest horse. Her name was D Majorette and she was a fierce beauty. I would show up early at the stables to groom her and prepare her for the morning session. She is the first horse I ever loved, and the first horse who ever threw me off. It was terrifying, it all happened in slow motion, and I was seriously hurt after I landed. And yet in a matter of days, I was riding again. On D Majorette. I was fearless. And I was hooked. She’s not the last horse who threw me, either. I had another serious toss in college, out on a friend’s farm in rural Virginia. The horse’s name was Amy. She was too large for me, and I was riding bareback, but it was exhilarating. The last thing I remember was flying through a pasture, Amy kicking up alfalfa. Then her hoof hit a small hole. She went down and sent me flying.

In between those two indelible memories are many other horse stories. My mother’s first boyfriend post-divorce lived on a horse farm in Antioch, Illinois. I remember the place fondly, it always smelled of burning leaves and horses. And by horses, I mean horses. It’s a smell that I really believe you only love if you love horses. I was mad at my mother for a very long time when she turned down his marriage proposal; I was determined to grow up on that farm.

But what happened when I was 12, I believe, ultimately changed the course of my life. My best friend Ellie’s family owned a horse-training facility in Kenosha, Wisconsin. It was a 45-minute drive from our home in Chicago. And there was a small horse there, Dusty Baron, who I’d fallen head-over-heels in love with. He was sweet, a little rough around the edges, but I was working so hard with him and was so dedicated to him. We’d go out into the fields, just the two of us, and ride for hours. Sometimes walking, sometimes galloping, but always as one. I was so very much in love with him that when the opportunity came to own him, to actually be his mama, I was ecstatic and just knew it was meant to be. My father was quick to agree that I should have this horse. It was so good for me, a moody child following my parents’ divorce, to have something that was such a positive influence on my life at the time. I was angry, bitter, and this little dappled horse was bringing me out of my shell. My father told me I could have him, but with the awful caveat that my mother agree. You can imagine where this story goes…

She said no. Wouldn’t even consider it. It wasn’t going to cost her anything. My father was going to cover it all. She didn’t even have to make the 45-minute drive back and forth to the farm; I would ride with Ellie and her family, who were there every weekend. But still, she said no. “What kind of an example will that set for her, if she thinks she can have anything she wants?” But I know the real reason she said no. It’s because her time has always been precious to her and she was worried that she was going to lose some of it while supporting me and my passion.

I didn’t get that horse. I pretty much gave up on that dream that dreaded day when my mother said no. And that stinging denial has hung around for years, for decades. It’s come up from time to time in therapy. I’ve had a hard time forgiving her for cutting short my childhood dream. Who knows where that passion could’ve led me? I’m not saying I was going to compete in the Olympics, but I might’ve followed a different path through the next ten years of my life. I might have had more confidence, might have worked harder in school, might have been more focused, kinder, happier. But now we’ll never know.

And so when I see my two-year old daughter clutching her book “If I Had a Horse: How Different Life Would Be” I am filled with such anticipation. I feel like she inherited that gene from me – that unbridled passion for all things equine. And I secretly cross my fingers that I can continue to cultivate this love affair with horses that she has begun. And I imagine the day she asks her father for a horse, and he says ask your mother. And I get to say yes.