Constable: A month on horseback helps 'urban cowgirls' heal

Traveling by horseback for a month, self-proclaimed “urban cowgirls” Megan Gray and Susan Brown pack light. They say they are able to leave all their physical and emotional baggage at home because “horses heal.”

For the next month, they'll be putting that philosophy in action on a 287-mile ride to Burlington, Iowa.

As certified horse-trainers and therapists, they've not only studied the connection between healing and horses - they've experienced it.

“I have eight fingers and I play the piano,” says Gray, a classically trained pianist and performance major at Barat College in Lake Forest who was just 24 when both her hands were mangled in a 1992 car crash.

A doctor amputated two fingers on her right hand at the middle knuckle and told her that her piano days were over. Gray, now 49 and living in Bloomingdale, says time spent riding horses helped her overcome the physical and emotional pain.

Brown, 51, of Chicago, has been riding horses for 35 years and has a Ride With Pleasure website, but she says her appreciation for the animals has grown since 2000, when she was diagnosed with painful fibromyalgia.

“I was incapacitated for six months,” Brown says. “I've been on that journey to heal ever since. Horses always make me feel better.”

Both women are drivers with Chicago Horse & Carriage in the city and say that even with the chaos of buses, cabs, cars, cops and pedestrians, those trips with horses are peaceful stress relievers.

This past Wednesday, Gray, riding her horse Shadow, and Brown, riding her horse Sergio, set off from Medinah Black Horse Troop stables in Carol Stream on a monthlong trek to Burlington, the Iowa town founded by Gray's great-great-grandparents.

This marks Brown's first “long-riding” adventure, but Gray has been doing them every year since 2008. Her first long ride was by necessity. Gray was teaching and living in Oklahoma when she decided to take a job in Chicago. She didn't own a horse trailer.

“How am I going to get my horse to Chicago?” she wondered.

She saddled up Evangeline, her Tennessee Walking Horse, on April 5, 2008, and got to Chicago by the middle of June. Since then, Gray says she embarks on a long ride every year as memorials to her parents and other friends and relatives who have died, as well as for everyone coping with some sort of pain.

“Every other expedition has been done with five bucks in my pocket and five pounds of gear,” says Gray, who traveled by herself, dependent upon a small tent and the kindness of strangers.

“The weirdest place I ever slept was on top of a bar in (a saloon in) Okay, Oklahoma, and then I moved to the pool table,” she says.

Her longest continuous expedition probably was the 572 miles from southern Texas to the northern border of the state. But Gray has ridden in sections from Ivy Island, Georgia, to the Santa Monica pier in California, which is where the famed Route 66 ends.

Gray chronicles her expeditions online at buffalomoonexpedition.blogspot.com. While she and Brown say they hope to raise awareness of fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome during their ride, they also want to raise the profile of the paths provided by the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy, a not-for-profit group that converts old, unused railroad lines into a nationwide network of public trails. About 80 percent of their journey will use these paths throughout Illinois, Gray says.

The women, who generally set up lodging at stables a few days in advance, are taking two trucks and a trailer with them. They'll drive both trucks and the trailer to where they expect to spend the night, then drive back to the starting point in the other truck and ride all day. When the horses are put away for the night, they'll drive back and get the second truck, and repeat the process.

While they don't accept donations, they say they hope the trip inspires people to see the good in life and donate to worthy causes.

In all her long-riding trips, Gray remembers just one notably dangerous moment. A car came so close that her foot hit the vehicle's side-view mirror.

The women's horses, both gelding Tennessee Walking Horses, are known for being calm animals with a gentle gait. The trips aren't races but slow journeys of discovery, Gray says. She rides just 7 miles on a typical day, with plenty of stops for grazing and sightseeing.

“We religiously ride two days on and one day off no matter what,” she says, noting the pair have plenty of rain gear.

The trip could encourage others to spend more time with horses, Gray says.

“Our country was built on the back of a horse,” she says. “But it's more than that. Horses really open doors for people emotionally. Emotional freedom starts on the trail.”

In earlier trips, her horse has helped her bond with strangers, some of whom became friends. Brown shares that appreciation for the power of a horse.

“It makes you forget about the world,” Brown says. “There is nothing else like horse time.”