For some, our DNA is coded to be obsessed with horses. It is written in the stars before our births—decreed by the Fates!—and so it shall be. One look into those chocolate covered maltball eyes, one nudge from a silky smooth muzzle and we just know.

That’s pretty much how it went for me; my entire future laid out before me, any chance of financial stability or buying a house before the age of 45 out the window. I was, and always will be, A Horse Girl.

My dad often remarks that animals are my favorite people, a statement I have a hard time denying. I was shaped by the horses who had a hand in raising me, offered respite when my OCD and anxiety spiked, distracted me from boy drama, slobbered in my ears, connected me with other girls just as horse-obsessed as I was that would become my friends for life, creatively inspired me, put me in the dirt (on rare occasions), covered for my mistakes (on hundreds of occasions), and left pieces of themselves behind, forever implanted in my heart and in my memories.

All of this is because of and for them.