I always wanted to own a horse

Debbie Matteson and her Marx-A-Mansion Dream House and 1962 Thunderbird. Debbie Solano is a REALTOR® and sells vintage "Beaver Cleaver-style" homes in midtown Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Debbie Matteson and her Marx-A-Mansion Dream House and 1962 Thunderbird

    • My mother had an Aladdin’s lamp. Actually, it was a sterling silver cigarette lighter shaped like Aladdin’s magical lamp. I remember kneeling at the coffee table in front of the big picture window of our house in Brewster, NY; I’d close my eyes and wish for a horse to appear on the front lawn; then I’d open my eyes and check to see if a horse had appeared. No horse.
    • Lucky for me, my next-door neighbor’s cousin Jeannie O’Riordan lived on a farm where they boarded horses for horse owners who lived in the city. Her father was a horseman from County Cork in Ireland; he had carried on the fox hunting tradition here in the United States. The stable was called Duhallow. It became my second home until I went off to college. I went there every day after school and worked for my ride brushing horses and cleaning tack. It was wonderful. I knew I was lucky. Perhaps the lamp had worked after all.
Duhallow today in Millbrook, NY

Duhallow today in Millbrook, NY

Jean O'Riordan gives Debbie Solano a tour of the farm, Duhallow, a fox-hunting stable and hunter-jumper training facility in Millbrook, NY.

Jeannie gives Debbie a grand tour of the farm.

    • I decided to be a minister, learning ancient Greek so I could read scripture in the original language. However, in college I fell in love and got married. I ended up becoming a law librarian and a certified records manager.
    • I took riding lessons when we lived in Pittsburgh and continued to dream about living on a farm. Nevertheless, I pursued my love of scripture and studied with a retired seminary professor one-on-one to learn text-critical methods. I was convinced I wanted to be a theological librarian.
    • I followed my ex-husband to Tulsa, where we bought a house in Chimney Hills. I started to take lessons with Libby Barrow in Bixby. That’s when I finally acquired my first horse. Come September was handed down to me from someone else in the barn. What a grand old mare. She lived to be 38 years old and is buried on our farm in Claremore, where my ex now lives.
    • I took hunter-jumper lessons from Libby Barrow and dressage lessons from Lynn Lyons. We bought a farm in Claremore and all seemed grand. Yet the call to study scripture kept calling me. I went to Southern Methodist University to learn Hebrew. I picked up a second Masters degree.
Debbie Solano with her dogs Obed and Tucker. Obed is a Golden Retriever. Tucker is a Shih-Tzu Poo.

Debbie Solano with her dogs Obed and Tucker.

  • I took a job at Sabre, working on the Subscriber Hardware Help Desk, speaking French to travel agents from the Caribbean and Quebec. Then I taught French in Bartlesville and worked as the director of religious education at a church in Broken Arrow.
  • In 2004 I divorced my farm and my horses and moved to a little house in Broken Arrow. I chose to sell real estate as a way to make a living. More specifically, I sell horse farms and homes in the country as a way of pursuing the lifestyle that I had as a kid.
  • I now live in Tulsa.
  • I sell horse properties in Tulsa, Bixby, Broken Arrow, Claremore, Jenks, Inola, Collinsville, Catoosa, Coweta, Owasso, Verdigris, and throughout Northeast Oklanoma.
  • I still want to buy a horse. (I’ll have to board.)
  • For more than eight years I have been an adorer at the Chapel of Peace at St. John’s Hospital in midtown Tulsa. Because real estate is a cut and run business, my shift is in the middle of the night twice a week when there are no possible conflicts with my schedule. It has been such a wonderful constant in my life.
  • I also have begun singing in the choir at the Church of St. Mary in Brookside. I’m a second soprano singing in the alto section. It’s been a real delight to sing under our talented young choir director, William Buthod.
  • Recently I’ve been recruited by one of the chaplains at St. John’s Medical Center in midtown Tulsa to be a weekend volunteer in their department. I am now a volunteer pastoral care visitor. The cool thing about doing pastoral care is that I don’t have to “do” anything, since it’s a ministry of “being.” Being present and keeping my mouth shut is something that has taken me a lifetime to learn, a skill that’s hard for someone who is an extrovert with so much to say about just about everything. As a pastoral care volunteer I don’t have to teach or preach or write a short term paper once a week. I have the wonderful opportunity to just be me and share my presence with others with a listening heart. It really keeps my life in perspective.
Share
Debbie Solano, CRS, Tulsa REALTOR® specializing in land, farms, and ranches

Debbie Solano, CRS, midtown Tulsa REALTOR® for Coldwell Banker Select — Land & Ranch Division, Real Estate Broker Associate specializing in selling and marketing country estates, horse properties, cattle ranches, equestrian properties, land, farms, and homes of every kind throughout Tulsa and Northeast Oklahoma. (edit)

Share