We were back in Australia for the race that stops the nation, The Melbourne Cup. As part of a pretty common tradition we ran a sweep amongst those who happened to be around. And for the first time we included the kids, Myles aged 5 and Ethan aged 4. It was all fun and games as they learned which horses they had, and boasted about the chances of their particular horses winning and making them rich – rich from the booty of $22.

Myles happened to get the horse Crime Scene, which was trained in our adopted country of Dubai by His Heighness Sheikh Mohammed’s stable, Godolphin. Myles was over the moon with the coincidental connection to HH.

The horse got a great 2nd place, but that was highly disappointing for Myles. Tears flowed as he got more upset than I had seen him in years. We tried to make the most of the situation and teach him some valuable lessons that not everyone can win, and so on. But it all went badly. We even tried playing down the event to make him know that the race didn’t really matter in the end, but that didn’t diffuse the situation at all. In the end I also tried to use Myles’s sense of pride toward Sheikh Mohammed to ease his grief. But that one blew right up in my face! I simply told Myles, come on now don’t cry. Then I rhetorically asked if he thought Sheikh Mohammed is at home crying on his bed because his horse didn’t win. Myles looked at me quite indignantly with his now blood-shot eyes, and replied shirtly to me, “Yes Dad, I’m sure he is!”.