{GBF Loves Coachella} An American Cowgirl

We have a family friend who is John Wayne's Asian doppelganger. He's 6'4, wears Levi's on Levi's, walks around in cowboy boots, and owns a ranch in Orange County. For years, he was the coolest person I knew. When we first moved to the US, we'd visit his ranch on the weekends and I'd ride his horses feeling oh-so assimilated even though I spoke very little English, wore sweatshirts printed with nonsensical phrases like "Shine Star Pretty," and was rocking sneakers stitched with Chinese characters. But when I was on the horse at the ranch with uncle John Wayne, I felt like an American girl.

Our visits grew more and more infrequent as I got older until one day they completely stopped. So I stopped riding horses. And it wasn't until a decade later that I got back in the saddle. The first five minutes were pure bliss as memories of my cowgirl days came flooding back....and then the wheezing, itchy eyes, and the gradual closing of my airways flooded in. I had become deathly allergic to horses.

So now I can only admire them from a distance. But at the Stylecaster x UGG Australia Coachella Style Haven, I couldn't help but get a little closer than I should as horses will forever tug at my heartstrings. At a time when I was a complete foreigner standing on foreign soil, they helped me feel like I was home.