The glorious Pearsons Vogue daughter of Odenuel grand daughter of Simeon Sarah.

Photograph Gigi Grasso

I’m right on track to release my second Danika and Yatimah book in the ‘As the Crow Flies’ series in a couple of months. When I think about this I realise I have a sort of fixation for life choices and fate.
There have been a couple of books I’ve written that keep me pondering how fate has at times grabbed us with both hands and led us to where we are today. But the question being, is it fate or is it just what happens in our lives, simply our choices?
The idea of what happens to a person on any given day that may dictate the course of something in the future, is something we have repeatedly experienced. In saying this, I do see how the concept of being in the right place at the right time could also have played a role in the final outcome

So is that still related to choice rather than fate.

In my books, often a secret is revealed at a future date, maybe many years from the original choice to hide the occurrence. This is something I’ve experienced and maybe you have also.  In our case whether you call it fate or a choice it was felt as a ripple effect like a stone being dropped into a pond.

You are fate’s shadow or fate’s sun, depending on which way you turn. ~Terri Guillemets

The next question is; have you ever felt fate indirectly dictated the next step in your life? For us Fate definitely became a sequence arranged and rearranged in a particular order to arrive at the final outcome. With some people retaliation or retribution years down the track can be the result of unthinking fateful choices.

In our instance I remember how one ‘out of the blue’ impulsive phone call led us down whole new path with our breeding program. Now when I look back the years resemble a long corridor with doors swinging open just as we needed, at specific intervals to lead us in the new direction.

The doors we open and close each day decide the lives we live. ~Flora Whittemore

In an article I’d written I mentioned how a newspaper  casually thrown on the back seat of a friends car contained a tiny classified which fatefully lead to the purchase of our beloved horse Odenuel.

Oden (Odenuel) as a yearling competing at the Classic in Victoria.

When you think about the possibility of the Newspaper being on the back seat and it being the one with that particular classified is staggering. And by buying Oden my impulsive phone call then presented us with another choice – in particular the acquisition of Simeon Sarah…

 Simeon Sarah at eight years old not long after we purchased her. The inspiration for Yatimah in my child’s books.

The breeding choices we made with our horses also sealed our fate, on one hand their inspiring beauty unbeknown to us at the time sealed our fate over a decade. So did we create our own fate? Yes, we did by our choices.  Now, I would say – fate has been predestined, whereas our choices were/are something we can control.

Life is the sum of all your choices. ~Albert Camus

Everyone’s life is fated, for instance most of us have no idea when we will leave this life, but we are certainly fated to leave one day. When you think about it, we write our own ever changing life story. We never quite know what will happen next. Change is inevitable in our life and due to that reason, it becomes intertwined with fate. But our fate can change too. It can be as simple as the choices we make, if we choose to smoke, we might be fated to die early rather than later.

I wonder if anyone really knows what they plan to do with their lives? Did I intend to be an author? Was it fate? No, it was a choice. Often circumstances change your direction even though you feel you are fated to do something else. With that being said, I believe in the quote above, ‘Life is the is the sum of your choices.’

The Fates – From Wikipedia: www.enwikipedia.org
The Moirae, Moerae or Moirai (in Greek – the “apportioners”, often called The Fates), in Greek mythology, were the white-robed incarnations of destiny (Roman equivalent: Parcae, euphemistically the “sparing ones”, or Fata; also equivalent to the Germanic Norns). Their number became fixed at three.

The Greek word moira literally means a part or portion, and by extension one’s portion in life or destiny. They controlled the metaphorical thread of life of every mortal from birth to death.

“Atropos was the oldest of the Three Fates, and was known as the “inflexible” or “inevitable.” It was Atropos who chose the mechanism of death and ended the life of each mortal by cutting their thread with her “abhorred shears.” She worked along with her two sisters, Clotho, who spun the thread, and Lachesis, who measured the length.”

Clotho – “spinner” spun the thread of life from her distaff onto her spindle. Her Roman equivalent was Nona, (the ‘Ninth’), who was originally a goddess called upon in the ninth month of pregnancy.
Lachesis – “allotter” or drawer of lots) measured the thread of life allotted to each person with her measuring rod. Her Roman equivalent was Decima (the ‘Tenth’).
Atropos – “inexorable” or “inevitable”, literally “unturning”, sometimes called Aisa was the cutter of the thread of life. She chose the manner of each person’s death; and when their time was come, she cut their life-thread with “her abhorred shears”. Her Roman equivalent was Morta (‘Death’)