The Ride of Her Life: The True Story of a Woman, Her Horse, and Their Last-Chance Journey Across America

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The Ride of Her Life: The True Story of a Woman, Her Horse, and Their Last-Chance Journey Across America by Elizabeth Letts He knew Annie was dirt poor, so he offered to get her into a state funded retirement home. Annie didn’t like to be rude to anyone offering help, so she politely told the doctor she’d think about it. Spears’ vulnerability shines through as she describes her painful journey from vulnerable girl to empowered woman.

Annie Wilkins was not a woman of the world. She lived her life quietly, working from dawn to dusk at her farm, but at age sixty-three, she made a decision that would impact her life and the lives of countless others. Annie decided to travel from her home in Maine cross country to California. Along the way, she made friends who offered her a place to lay her head at night, a place to sit and share a meal with someone, as well as water for Depeche Toi and Tarzan. She carried their kindness, as well as their stories, with her as she continued her journey, adding more stories of more people, their wisdom, their insights into places along the way, and even friends she should stop and stay with in her travels. As her journey came to the attention of a journalist, her journey became one that fascinated everyone. People would run out to greet her, cities would offer her a place to stay, she became a celebrity of sorts, and met a few people of note along her journey. She met a man named Andy and his wife Betsy in a tavern on her journey who asked if she was the woman riding her horse from Maine, and invited her to join them for dinner. The next morning when she went to get her horse, she found this man sketching Tarzan, Depeche Toi happily beside him. Later, she would find out just who he was, but in her rush, just looking to get on the road, it never occurred to her that this sketch could hold value for anyone but her. She arrived in Redding CA in December 1955. After her trip to CA, she returned to her home state of Maine but instead of Minot, she moved in with her good friend in Whitefield Maine where she lived 24 years past her two-year prognosis. 12 years after returning home she was willing to turn her diary and photos into a book, “The Last of the Saddle Tramps.” A triumphant accomplishment from start to finish.I find it reassuring in this time when some friends, some family and some media outlets are shouting about how divided our country is that perhaps we’re more alike than one would think.

Another thing that was wild to me is there were many occasions where Annie would spend the night in a small town jail. Not because she had broken any law, but because it was a place to be indoors and safe for the night. She might happen upon a police officer and ask to be escorted to the nearby jail. I hate camping, so I suppose a one-night stay in a cell might be better. But I’m not so sure. lol As I read, impressed with her tenacity, I had to reflect on how little Annie's world resembled my own. I marveled at how safely she traveled, assisted by so many, believing this would not be what she would encounter trying to make such a journey today, which saddened me. She was a strong and strong-willed woman, but she lived in a time when we were not as afraid of our neighbors and strangers as we seem to be now. She defied many odds, including her doctor's prediction.

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Throughout the next months, as I spun the results of my research into a story, my own vista grew smaller. But Annie’s world got bigger and bigger as she traveled from the wooded confines of New England to the wide-open spaces of the West. And it seemed that the longer I stayed in my own home, the better I understood Annie. She was a single woman, short and square, working class and proud of it, divorced and with no children at a time when women were judged mostly by their relation to others—mother, wife, widow. Annie Wilkins never went anywhere or did much of anything except work in the kinds of jobs available to a woman with a sixth grade education. She was trapped in a life that was pretty much inevitable for her. She had no means of escape. Monarch butterflies wait out dangerously cold and wet winter conditions in Mexico until the spring, when they begin to move north in search of their sole food source, milkweed.

This is such a beautifully written and heartwarming true story of a spunky lady who, against all odds, rode a horse across America. Starting in Maine, her only wish was to see the Pacific Ocean, a wish she’d heard her mother make, but was sadly never able to attempt. Elizabeth Letts shares in the last chapter, “. . . Annie had trust. When she set off, she was sure she was going to find the same America she’d grown up believing in: A country made up of one giant set of neighbors. People who’d be happy to give you a helping hand People spread out far and wide. . . with different accents, and different favorite dishes, and different kinds of houses, people who lived with dust or traffic, snowstorms or tornadoes, on mountains or flatlands, in cities or small towns. People who liked Eisenhower or couldn’t stand him, people who were fundamentally decent and, deep down, the same.” In 1954, sixty-three-year-old Maine farmer Annie Wilkins embarked on an impossible journey. She had no money and no family, she had just lost her farm, and her doctor had given her only two years to live. But Annie wanted to see the Pacific Ocean before she died. She ignored her doctor's advice to move into the county charity home. Instead, she bought a cast-off brown gelding named Tarzan, donned men's dungarees, and headed south in mid-November, hoping to beat the snow. Annie had little idea what to expect beyond her rural crossroads; she didn't even have a map. But she did have her ex-racehorse, her faithful mutt, and her own unfailing belief that Americans would treat a stranger with kindness. Annie Wilkins lives in rural Maine, and is endeavoring to continue to run the family farm. It hasn’t gone well. Between a series of events beyond her control and an aging body, she falls behind, and then more so, until the bank gives notice of foreclosure. At the same time her lungs aren’t doing well; the doctor gives her two or three years to live, but only if she does so restfully. She is offered a place at the county home, which is essentially a charity lodging for the indigent.Annie Wilkins: 62-year-old Maine single farmer diagnosed with TB expected to live only two to four years. Hadn’t stepped foot outside the state, except briefly as a child. Embodies Maine’s independent spirit. She travels on a horse with a dog, and at some point she catches an attention of reporters and people start following her story. Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.” This well written book shows us the why sixty-three-year-old Annie Wilkins decided she had no choice but to make the naïve decision to ride from her failing farm in Maine, to the state of California, in 1954. Annie had lost her family farm, was broke and her doctor said she was dying. She was too proud to go live in a charity home or with friends of her late family. So Annie buys an aged Morgan horse, loads her belongings on her and her horse, Tarzan, and starts out for California, with her dog, Depeche Toi. Sadly, Annie has no idea what she is asking of herself and her animals. It's really only through the kindness of strangers, and her never give up attitude, that Annie makes it to California in 1956.