“This is not an ugly photo. It’s a woman who has lived 52 summers, with her horse”

It was the essence of joy. We pulled up at the top and our faces were broken open: five middle-aged women, carrying the juggle of children, of husbands, parents, businesses, of health. The push-and-pull of middle age.

But on that hill, none of those things mattered; instead, we were returned to our 12-year-old selves. We rode up into the bush, the wind dropping as if it had never been. Frank was so surefooted, looking around, picking his way up the stony, steep track, over logs, between trees.

The track was so steep that someone shouted for a stop as her saddle slipped. While my friend readjusted the girth, I turned and looked at the country spread out beneath us. Frank looked too and I rubbed his face. Hours later, we slid from our saddles as if they were actually magic carpets. There was the machinery shed where we’d parked the floats, the sheep yards, the garden. Our eyes slowly lost their stars.

I drove home thinking about the way I felt looking at a photo of myself. It was such a contrast to how ageless I was on that ride, released back into an essential part of myself.

Our bodies hold histories. There have been books written about how, when we repress our emotions, griefs, tensions and worries, it comes out in our bodies. Our bodies don’t lie. But our bodies also remember the good. So when we feel joy, when happiness feathers against our souls, our bodies know that too.

Movement processes emotion for me: if I go for a ride, a long walk, or a swim, I feel better — released even — and I remember that my aging, lined face is a privilege.

When I got home, I looked again at the photos. There’s one where the camera has caught me leaning into Frank, my hand on his head. The focus is quite sharp. My hair is wispy and unkempt. My hands — the fingernails blunt, the skin weathered — are becoming just as I remember my mother’s and grandmother’s. My teeth are not white; I have lines around my mouth and eyes, lines that are only going to deepen. But of course, what’s also there is a moment between Frank and me in the journey I’ve taken with him, from a nervous young horse, wanting to please but being afraid, to a confident soulmate. Along the way he has gifted me my younger self. I make myself look at the photo again. I see my mother, grandmothers, the aunties and great aunties, all slowly revealing themselves in my face. When did we collectively decide that lines on a face were ugly? This is not an ugly photo. It’s beautiful, it’s a woman who has lived 52 summers, with her horse.

I come back to my desk, open my notebook and write to remind myself of all those sensations: of the mountain air spiced with prickly bark, wattle and white gum. The sweet scent of horse and leather. The horse himself, his striking hard hoof, the scoop of nostrils, the wild bold bone, the rush of air as we galloped, over logs and rocks and up and up into the sky. Remember, I write, the moment when your body becomes something else, something greater than you can ever be on your own. Remember, beauty is bigger and more difficult to define than the image you see in the mirror. Remember to seek life.

Maggie MacKellar is an author who lives in Tasmania. Subscribe to her newsletter The Sit Spot: maggiemackellar.substack.com

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