Wild Horse Therapy

Recently, Mark and I spent four days at the Wild Horse Resort near Pendleton, Oregon. WH is a golf course, RV park, casino, hotel, and all-around good place to spend a few days away. A daughter and son-in-law joined us there.

We had booked a package, which included our room, endless golf, a cart, and numerous coupons for discounts here and there in the resort.

We had to book tee-off times, which was different for us, but the resort was very accommodating, and there were plenty of options. At Ritzville, certain groups claim certain times and it’s understood among the frequent players here. For example, the Ritzville Women’s Golf Group tee off on Monday mornings, the coffee clatch guys tee off around noon each workday, etc.

The resort also offered a multiplex (Marilyn and I saw Jurassic World, which I would not recommend), a fine sports bar, good restaurants, swimming pool and spa, pro shop, gift shop, and numerous other amenities.

We knew nobody on the course, unlike Ritzville where the stranger is a rarity.

The Ritzville Golf Course is similar to our churches insofar as it is central to our social gatherings. That community is integral to the enjoyment that golf in Ritzville offers.

The anonymity was a different experience for us, but players there were equally pleasant and thoughtful. It’s probably typical of golfers everywhere.

Fairways at WH are longer and wider, boast numerous large sand and water hazards, and are a pleasure to play. It was a nice change to look upon something taller than a water tower, and the Blue Mountains and valley provide a lovely panorama.

Let’s face it, Ritzville doesn’t offer much in the way of visual excitement or beauty. I’m not referring to people, so no letters to the editor please. Gaping admiration is not my first reaction to careening tumbleweeds.

However, at one point this summer, while riding down Fairway 8, Patty and I found ourselves gazing with awe upon undulating wheat in the field adjacent to the school.

It rippled in the wind like The Wave at a Seahawks game.

Admiring the movement of wheat in the wind is a pleasure I have developed only since moving here, probably out of desperation for even a modicum of the visual splendor I found in abundance elsewhere.

Having moved from the West side where everything is lush and healthy (except the population which is mostly dense, enraged, and stressed), the areas between here and Cheney or Moses Lake do challenge one’s senses.

A few years after we’d moved here, my wonderful niece, Avia, and I were driving into Spokane for a little shopping therapy, and simultaneously commented on how pretty the fields looked. It was spring, somewhat rainy, and new-growth-green dominated. We looked at one another in stunned amazement. When did the transformation occur that caused us to see beauty in the fields and countryside surrounding Ritzville?

It was a blessing, and now Mark and I can sit on Avia and Alan’s deck and gaze contentedly upon a horizon far, far away with nothing impeding our view except the occasional haboob.

I do think our golf course, which is perfect for my friends and me, would be improved with a water feature. The dried up depression, beginning about half way down the rough between Fairways 3 and 4 and continuing to just before the maintenance shed, would be the perfect location. Envision a shallow pond surrounded by cattails and reeds with a spewing fountain in the middle, ducks happily splashing and quacking, and a bench or two for those seeking respite.

It would calm golfers who are unhappy after the devastation of playing Fairway 3, and finally Ritzville could claim water-view property.

Perhaps the coffee guys, who meet Monday-Friday at 9:30 a.m. in the Fairway Café, are looking for a project to keep them in shape and improve our town. I’ll be happy to share my vision with them.

Wild Horse Resort offers packages (on the Internet) that are affordable and attractive. You could be inspired, too, by an experience there. If you are looking for a get-away that you will enjoy, Mark and I urge you to consider it.