I've heard it many times: "If it's meant to happen it will happen," or, "If you want something go get it." Sometimes it's hard to know whether to reach out or to just sit back and hope for the best, which is what I always used to do. For some reason I just thought that these things I wanted so badly to happen would just happen on their own, and consequently they wouldn't -- but I recently turned that around. Here's my story of the time I finally realized what I could do -- when I made my childhood dream come true.

It all started when I visited the barn where my fifth grade best friend rode horses. I wasn't going with any plan to start riding there or to fall in love with a horse. I completely remember walking into the barn and hearing something along the lines of, "Do you want to ride this horse? He's new and good for beginners." The funny thing is that I remember looking at him and thinking how unfriendly and plain he looked and that I always imagined my dream horse to have a name like lightning or something, not Pete -- of course this was just me judging a book by it's cover. I got all ready and lead him out to ride in the ring, and I immediately took a liking to him. He was so smooth and gentle, and after dismounting I was able to bond with him more. It was pretty perfect. Following the first ride, I ended up riding him for the next two years, until one day his previous owners came back for him. Of course I was heartbroken and thought it was the end of the world, but I did get over it. Skip forward another two years and I find out my grandparents were moving into a home five minutes away from my house, complete with a horse farm. This was of course crazy and so exciting, but little did I know that after about a year, it would get even better. Pete would actually come to live there as my horse. Before I explain how he ended up there, I just want to talk about the fact that I had imagined many times this happening, but had always just imagined it happening randomly. In my daydreams I would get a call saying, "Hey, you want this horse?" and he would randomly appear the next day.

I was always too scared to actually reach out, but one day my mom said, "Why don't you just contact his owners?" So I went out, got back in touch with them and shot them a text. Obviously I wasn't going to just say, "Hey, can I have your horse?" I simply said that if Pete ever needed a new home, to let me know. I immediately got a call. It turned out he wasn't being ridden anymore and did need a new home. A month or so later, he was mine. If I hadn't sent that one simple text, none of this would have ever happened at all. I guess what I'm saying is, I completely know now that I can have the power to get what I want, and it's not all entirely out of my hands like I sometimes might think it is. So go send that text people.