29
Summer shoots are done. I sent Lowri home to London for a week or so.
Carmine is still working; she has about a week left, then we have ten days off together before the wedding.
Mom and Claire have everything well in hand; there are no decisions left that I need to be part of.
It was a joint decision that I had enough on my plate to worry about, say, flowers.
Or what napkins to use from the caterer’s choice of seven cloth ones they stock.
I really do not care, nor do I think I will remember.
Yesterday, a bunch of us flew to New York and did the final fittings of the outfits and tuxes.
It was the first time I flew in the new jet.
It is set up as a twelve-seater; it can hold sixteen, but we wanted a more open space. And that was what Dad found, actually.
Someday I will describe it. Not now.
And Kelley is full bore on prepping for the wedding and bringing in the folks that she wants for security.
So, Claire and I, along with Cleo’s daughters, are going horse camping in the Allegheny National Forest for a few days.
Some trails along old logging roads are closed to vehicle traffic, separated by gravel logging roads.
I am taking Lightning this time, taking her on the trail.
Shara is on Blanket. The two girls are on bred Arabians.
That means a bit older and more settled horses that Mom breeds every other year, and in their off year, they need to be ridden to keep them used to the saddle.
And Mom found us four pack horses, all quarter horses, actually.
And we have a rig that can handle eight horses and us in the front, and we are off.
We keep these mares as saddle horses because Mom stops breeding long before the useful life of the mare is over, and having been ridden, they are valuable riders for those wanting an older horse.
And that is where you should start a kid, far safer.
This is a gentle ride, a chance for Sarah and me to decompress.
Sarah and Kelley accompany Lowri and myself on every single shoot we do.
And it has been an exhausting summer. I prefer the runway to what we have been doing, but summer is fashion spreads, as you can shoot on location so many places you can not six months of the year.
So I have done the Grand Canyon, including riding a bloody mule.
I have sailed a sailboat out of Seattle.
Vancouver, you can send me back there anytime.
On some island off the Alaska coast, there was a company that made tents and backpacking stuff.
You get the idea. I am photographed as if I am playing, when I most certainly am not.
There was a bunch of western wear still, surprise.
And a couple of weeks in London for KK Brands doing the extreme close-ups that Angel can not pull off, no matter how good the makeup, and many have tried.
The reviewers can also tell her face from mine.
Is it waist to the top of the head? They can not tell.
But as soon as it gets to the chest and up, they can see the subtle difference.
The camping was really good. Along one side of the National Forest is a massive lake called Kinzua. And there are old logging roads and access roads from when the lake was built in the 1960s. It was these roads that we focused on, as we had access to the lake itself at the camp sites.
We were out for six days, five nights, and that means four complete days of just relaxing and riding. Sarah had a satellite phone, but has she used it at all? I am not aware of it. And no one, not one bloody person, called me. And that is what I wanted.
Four girls, one packing concealed, we were fine.
No one bothered us, and no one expected those four gals to include a top model.
We met a few hikers, a few fishermen, and a handful of pack riders like ourselves.
And that means that two of the nights with the pack riders were a bit more interesting, as we had a campfire with some music, the same group, two nights in a row.
And I know the young girls made some friends.
It was interesting hearing them talk to two of the girls we met who were about their age.
Amy and Kim are Cleo’s daughters. Amy will be a senior and Kim a junior in a few weeks. The group we met was a 4-H group from Ohio, and the two who took a liking to Amy and Kim were Kristy and Marlene, both juniors also. Marlene started the conversation. “So Amy, these two are related to you?”
“No, not at all. Our mother works for Shannon, and we work for Shannon’s mother this summer, and I think this winter also.”
“What do you do for Shannon’s mom?”
Kim answered, “Dig shit out of stalls. It is a small private breeding facility and breeds Arabians and Forest Horses.”
“And not Appaloosas?”
“Oh no, those are so that Shannon can ride.”
Now, think about this: you are like what, sixteen or seventeen?
You are into 4-H and horses. You are female and in America.
And you do not see that the Shannon is with you, riding a familiar-looking Appaloosa named Lightning, which is common knowledge by now, and you do not put it together when you are told that Shannon races?
This is getting interesting. And with that, I really started paying attention, and Sarah, of course, picked up on it.
I just shook my head when Sarah was looking to tell her all this to go on, as I did not want to stop.
“Then Shannon, does she like racing on the track?”
Now I was really stopped. Race on the track? 4-H pushed rodeo and Barrel racing big time. They think that every American child should be able to ride a stallion or wrestle a steer to the ground.
“No, Shannon is a barrel racer.”
There it is out.
Kim was then asked, “What does your mother do for Shannon?”
OK, this will make it very clear.
“Mom is the manager at a photo studio where they are being models and shoot commercials and advertisements and stuff like that.”
“You mean like real-life models?”
Kim replied, now looking at me, “Yeah, like real-life models.”
“Are any like really famous?”
And by now, Sarah is losing it and can not stop laughing.
One of the adults, a man named Ken, was paying some attention.
“What, you two girls actually know supermodels?”
And by then, both Amy and Kim could not contain their laughter, and Amy said, “And Ken, so do you.”
Ken replied, “Girls, I assure you, I do not know a single supermodel, and if I ever met one, I would bow down and kiss the ground at her feet.”
Of course, this is all in fun and good humor. We had spent the night before with this crowd, and they are cool.
So I finally could not take it anymore. “Kristy and Marlene, would the two of you like to attend the wedding of a real-life supermodel in about two weeks? Would you enjoy that?”
They looked at me and still did not figure it out, but Sally, Ken’s wife, who had been paying attention, did. “Girls, if I were you, I would say yes to that offer.”
Marlene asked, “But why? Shannon is just joshing us a bit; we know that.”
And that was all my team of four could take. The four of us, and Sally, once she figured out why we were laughing so damn hard, could not stop laughing for a good fifteen to twenty minutes. We would all stop, then one of us would look at another, and we would start over again.
I finally got myself under control and, with laughter-filled broken words, said, “Girls, I am Shannon, as in the cover model Shannon who Barrel races. Lightning is the horse I raced and was on the front of some magazine in the last two months.
And I am getting married outside of Slippery Rock in about two weeks, and I am inviting you.”
“You mean you are a real model?”
“Yes, Kristy, I am a real model.”
“But you ride well.”
“Girls, if you come to my wedding, do not bring a gift. You will be the only teens besides these two in attendance. I can allow two adults, like parents or whatever, but the venue is full, and you will spend the day on the farm. We are being married on my family’s farm.”
Sally then added, “Yes, I have heard about that.”
“And girls, I have trunks full of high-end western and riding clothes that I think you both can wear. I would appreciate it if you left with a few outfits.”
Obviously, this changed things in the shared camp that night.
Ken and Sally, the leaders, were taken aback that I, a model that they were aware of, could and would spend a week just trail riding in Pennsylvania.
In the end, we would become friends, and they said that they would set things up so that they could bring the two girls to the wedding.
And of course, Sally had questions galore about the wedding.
She had married only a few years ago. She is active in the 4-H, and she and Ken co-sponsor the program outside of Conneaut, Ohio.
The remote northeastern corner of the state, and just a few hours or so from Slippery Rock and Mercer.
I invited them to bring the 4-H down for a day at a breeding farm in late fall. Lord knows I do not have time before then.
Sally asked what the clothes expectations were for all four of them.
I explained that they would be filmed and photographed, and you had to sign a release to be allowed into the wedding as it was being shot as a fashion event, so be prepared for that.
And I told her that there were at least a dozen designers that I knew of coming, including the one who was now featuring me in the western wear campaigns being shot for the spring.
That in the wedding party itself, there were four actual models, and that a fifth, my maid of honor, was in fashion but not a model.
That her family had ties to European modeling and fashion, as her brother is a former male model who is partnered to one of the largest fashion empires outside of the US.
This was all unexpected, of course.
Then she asked, “Shannon, and your gown?”
I laughed. “Sally, my gown was given to me after my first runway in Bryant Park last fall and has been revised from a runway item, meaning not really designed for six to seven hours of wearing, into a wearable one-off by the original designer, and he is doing all the rest of the bridal party.”
“And you have been seen wearing this gown by your soon-to-be wife?”
I could tell that, like a lot of country folks, Sally was a bit reluctant to talk about the fact that I am a lesbian.