Chiron's Grove

Almost a year

2010-08-16T12:56:00.004-04:00

(The title links to a song.)

It's been almost a year since I posted. Finally the grief at losing the farm has begun to ease. I can't write about that day in June 2009 when it all fell apart, the accumulated injuries, illnesses, court happenings, and mistakes crushing the beautiful dream while I stood in the driveway and watched it go away, piece by piece and beloved animal by beloved animal.

Here I sit now on a mountaintop in a light, pleasant townhouse. Lucy is here at my feet, now fifteen years old. Shadow is here, too, sleeping downstairs where it is cooler. Rocket is still with us. He lives in Fayston and I ride him 3 or 4 times per week when all goes well. We raced 50 miles in the "Moonlight in Vermont" ride and placed with the top ten. Elizabeth's horse Teddy (a.k.a. "Ed") died last week; I was there at the Dykema's with him when he left. Memphis lives there too. She belongs to Ne-Ne, Rachelle's niece. Coco is now "Taz" and belongs to Alex. The others I can't talk about--hurts too much.

Life feels like somebody just pulled the knife from a deep wound.

The boys and I went on a picnic yesterday very near here, along a stream near a shallow pool. We ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and water melon and the boys played with water and stones and sticks while I read to them from The Fellowship of the Ring. Danny waded right out into the stream and played tug-the-stick with Shadow. Then he waved the stick around in warrior-like movements, which Shadow understood to be the same game in a different form, much to Danny's amusement. Shadow tried to find rocks as they disappeared under water when Danny tossed them. Lucy walked in the water and drank deeply, then struggled back to shore trying to stay upright on her weak rear-end muscles with the extra weight of the water pulling her down. Danny helped her. Mikey tried to help her, but she was too heavy for him. Mikey balanced a stick on each shoulder and walked back and forth from a little natural dais near the stream to a huge rock a bit downstream from it. He counted how many times he could go back and forth without either of them falling off. Then he decided which stick had fallen least often. He rejoiced when he caught one on the way down. "Mommy, look!"

Then we came home. I slung my sweatshirt under Lucy to help her up the path again to the car. I lifted her right over the bigger rocks and stones on our way. We all decided that we needed to go back there and picnic again.

This new phase requires a new blog. You can find it at www.ididntsaythat.org. It is something like a blog and something like a workshop for things I'm working on. Enjoy.

So far so good

2009-10-23T06:47:00.002-04:00

Yesterday I left around noon. Stopped in Richmond for a yogurt and a coffee. That was a challenge, trying to find something nutritious at a gas station stop. Everything is either white flour or sugar, it seems, in your average gas station. I found some lonely little yogurt cups tucked behind the pillar of a refrigerator, looking almost like they were ashamed to be in such company.

I drove down to Waitsfield after that, where a nice man had been waiting for me for a long time to show me the car. Brent looks like a younger version of Cordell. He was there with two small children. He told me the car in question was called "Ellie." He said that his daughter specifically requested that I know that. So we sat down in the car, a Volvo 240 from 1989, and he started telling me all about it, and then he said, "The only things that don't work are the air conditioning and the cruise control." I sagged. Either of those was a deal-breaker. Note to self: Always ask what's wrong with a car before going to see it.

So that put my day off rather a lot. I had been thinking of trying to get to Boston to see Elaine Bulman, but she didn't return my call that I left at her work. My guess is that she wasn't even in yesterday; she's usually pretty good about returning phone calls. So I decided to head for Manchester, VT to do a little shopping at the outlets there.

On the way down, I started recording a quasi-book on my cell phone. This became tedious, so I stopped at Radio Shack in Rutland and bought a portable recording device, headphones with microphone, and some batteries. Then I decided it was too late in the afternoon to go to the outlets in Manchester and headed west on Route 4 towards the New York throughway (Route 87).

As I drove along I recorded whatever came into my head. I'm thinking that a sort of mini-book about traveling--traveling away from all the hurt of the past few months while traveling further and further into my own past--would while away the boring moments of the trip. I talked a lot about my very recent ex-boyfriend's life and my own experience of him, and tried to examine how I got into the situation with him I was in until yesterday morning. It was a good exercise. Clearly people are complex. Everybody, and every relationship, has light and dark sides. But my main error was--as always--that I didn't believe in myself. Maybe this trip will help.

I stopped at a Japanese restaurant and ate spring rolls and won-ton soup and drank some tea. The bill was less that $5.00. So far so good in the saving money department.

I got to Lake George and discovered, lo and behold, outlets! So I stopped at Orvis and Brooks and was directed around the building to the next shopping center over. There I found the boots I was looking for and a sort of black cat-suit that I planned to wear under a summer dress to convert it into a hip winter outfit.

I got on the highway, then, and went south, chatting all the way to my recording device. It was very, very windy--leaves blowing all over the place so loud I coul hear the impact recording on the sound track as I talked. It got dark and a bit spooky.

I got off the highway at New Baltimore and found a tiny room (feels about the size of a large Christmas present) in a Best Western. I watched tv, ate out of the snack machines, and talked to Oliver and Dad on the phone. I like this hotel. the people are friendly and they look like North Country people (the women wear neither bras nor makeup).

And now I'm ready to set off again going south. I'll call some of the friends I'm going to visit today after nine or so.

Changes

2009-10-22T09:53:00.002-04:00

Chiron's Grove has had to shut down for economic reasons.

I have been grieving about that & about various family court things for the past several months. But now that the dust has settled, I'm looking for a way to rebuild my life.

Chapter One: Breaking up with a wonderful man who nevertheless drags me down. Check.

Chapter Two: Peruse Facebook and make a list of friends to visit with the next five days that I have off from all parenting and dating obligations (due to the breakup listed above and to the fact that the boys are with their father this weekend).

Soon after I woke up this morning, I decided to capitalize on my new-found freedom by visiting friends who are far enough away to require more driving than your average bored 13- and 10-year-old would want to sit through to see. I made a phone call to the Mennonite-Your-Way people and am awaiting an email with a list of hosts in the towns I'm targeting: Boston, Philadelphia, the Lancaster area, and Harrisonburg, VA. Boston has grad school friends, Philadelphia and its environs has relatives, Lancaster has high school and college friends, and Harrisonburg has an old and much loved roommate. I hope that by getting in touch with people from way back I can get better in touch with myself and thus answer the question that burns after the kind of upheaval I've been through: How shall I then live?

Now that Mother's Day is Over--Brothers' Day

2009-05-11T12:22:00.002-04:00

This is dedicated to my brothers, who don't consider that sisters count as women, but hey, it's a MANtage.

Happy Mother's Day Mom!

2009-05-10T09:39:00.000-04:00

Getting Close to April 15th

2009-04-02T17:04:00.003-04:00

The hose was too short. The pump was broken so it was running all the time. What to do?

Meg

2009-03-16T23:58:00.000-04:00

Meg and Magic on a long trail ride. Meg is a good horse to put new riders on in the ring and intermediate riders on for the trail. She LOOOOOVES the trail!

Meg ahead of us on the left.

Meg's beautiful eye.

When we first got her, I couldn't ride her because I'd just had shoulder surgery. She's so beautiful!

Math Magic Trick

2009-03-16T19:08:00.005-04:00

I posted this before but couldn't get the videos to load. Now they should work.

Math Magic Trick, Part II

2009-03-16T19:08:00.000-04:00

I cheated and kept the camera on a bit because they were so CUTE!

Math Magic Trick, Part III

2009-03-16T19:07:00.000-04:00

Mikey will solve this difficult math problem in SECONDS. It's magic!

Too Hilarious!

2009-03-05T21:38:00.001-05:00

This one's for you, guys.

The Reality of the Heart

2009-02-13T12:15:00.017-05:00

Alex and I rode Meg and Cocoa (Chiron's Foxtrot, pictured above) the day before yesterday as part of their training for the Mud Ride coming up April 25th & 26th. Anna came along on Dante.

It was raining. Nobody cared.

Picture the action of a Saddlebred Morgan cross. If you can't, I'll tell you what you need to know: they have shoulders that are sloped way backwards, unlike other horses. This causes a few things to be different. For one, they hold their heads very high. Those shoulders are set so far back and slope in a way that pulls the neck and head up in a beautiful, muscular arch. For another, they can reach very high with their front feet. Again, the shoulders are out of the way so they can have amazing action going on in front. Key word: Drama. And also, when you ride this type of horse, you sit further back so that you aren't limiting that wonderful shoulder action. But this means that you can't just plunk up and down on the post. You aren't landing on shoulders that are supported by legs when you post--you are landing on the weakest part of the horse's back. It is necessary to be a good partner for your horse that you ride smooooothly.

I have never done this before meeting Cocoa and getting him to the point of being ridden (after a good year & a half of effort because he was PSYCHO HORSE whe he first got here). The first time I rode him at the trot I couldn't figure out why he bounced me back up into the air each time I tried to land it. Alex said, "Stay up longer. Stay up for two."

"Two what?" I asked, going th-thud th-thud th-thud all the while.

"Two--you know, two! Two of the things you do when you post?"

"What, like go up on the right going forward, touch down, then (th-thud) go up on the (thud) left going forward?"

"WhatEVER," he said, losing interest.

Teenagers, I thought. What's the use of having a bloody talented kid working at your farm if he can't tell you what makes him great? (Hi Alex).

I thudded around a bit more, then went in and did the research.

Next time, I was ready. Treeless sheepskin saddle--my favorite, favorite saddle of all time. Sit the wrong way--instead of ankles, ass, & head in a line, sit like you're on a Harley. Davidson, I mean. Feet way forward, trust your body to stay on. Square those shoulders. Notice the extra leverage across the reins to the head--wow can you ever keep that horse in a line sitting so far back. Hands up, chin up, smile.

And it was magical. Sitting so far back, I could use rear haunch power to propel the post. It wasn't up-down, up-down any more, it was glide up&forward, relax, up&foward, relax. No banging on his back. And then he cantered. Glorious! He kept his head up--he reached dramatically up so high and forward it was like he was reaching to gather the whole land and sky under him for the next bound forward. That rear was right under me, propelling him with incredible power, and yet--there I was, in the midst of all this drama and action, hardly moving at all. Sit back, I reminded myself. Head up, chin up, smile.

Just then we moved up on Meg, who was doing an ordinary horse canter, and Alex. I turned my wrists for extra elegance, straightened my shoulders, liftd my chin a little more, then turned only my head sideways and smiled at him as we passed. "Bye-bye!" I sang.

"You...!" he said, startled, but just then we were in the zone and he--he just wasn't. He was riding an ordinary horse. We galloped handily past. But I felt like I was sitting in a rocking chair.

Truly this horse needs to be ridden side-saddle by a beautiful woman with long flowing skirts, a a tailored cut jacket that emphasizes a shapely bosom, a completely unnecessary riding crop that just serves to show off how steady the hands are, and an elegant hat set at a rakish angle.

What's particularly wonderful about this horse is that, even on the dirt roads of Charlotte, clad with dirty barn clothes and a cheap knit hat, drenched and dripping, I am that woman.

Reality on a horse is always the reality of the heart.

Story on a String

2009-02-12T17:01:00.009-05:00

I love coming across objects that tell a story.

Two days ago, Elizabeth and I were exercising Teddy and Memphis. Danny and Mikey were at home and had been told not to let the dogs follow us. We went about three mils and as we came up over the hill to the driveway, two happy black dogs came bounding up onto the dirt road from the farm's entrance. "How did they get out?" we both said, and then we noticed the long blue baling twine each dog had attached to her collar, and laughed.

Danny and Mikey had been in the house with the dogs when the dogs started to bark and howl and whine to go outside. Danny became afraid that Molly (Elizabeth's dog) wanted to pee, but he wanted also to follow directions and keep her at home. So he found some blue plastic baling twine and tied it to the back door and to Molly's collar. Then Shadow wanted to go out too, so Danny tied him out beside Molly. And of course they both broke free and were running around dragging their blue strings behind them when we came home.

I had to laugh, thinking of how the string carried its story to me. Danny's earnest fingers had left a sheen of meaning around that string.

This got me thinking of other things that tell vivid stories. A wet towel on the floor. Lipstick on a glass of wine in somebody else's house. Jars of applesauce in the freezer. Stitches on a hand-made quilt.

What are your favorite things that tell stories?

Killing Chickens

2009-02-09T09:25:00.031-05:00

We didn't get to (let's call her) Penny's until about 12:30. Her friend Kathy was not pleased because we had been due about an hour and a half before that. Why we were so late could fill another blog post, but none of it is my business to talk about & so I'll stay silent on that subject.

Penny has an injury to her knee that makes it painful for her to walk around and causes her to lose her balance on occasion. She also has a farm to run, with everything from ducks to Belgians living on about an acre. Once when I went to Penny's house, she was out back, and after I walked in the front door I found myself looking down this wolf-dog's throat. His name is "Fang" (yes, that's his real name). Fortunately, Penny also has another dog who makes it his business to protect people from Fang. That is why I still have a throat. I stood frozen just inside the door, unable to leave because dogs like Fang see retreat as proof that they are the winners and attack full out, and unable to go further into the house because that would have enraged him to the point that the other dog would not have been able to hold him off. After about ten minutes, Penny happened to walk back inside and she called him off.

The meat chickens, our business of yesterday, live(d) in a chicken coop about the size of a large bathroom. Because of Penny's injury, the chicken coop hadn't been cleaned in at least a month. It was filled with a clay-like combination of chicken excrement and sawdust. The sun was shining on the chicken coop and the smell was overwhelming. Danny held his nose, then started to gag and walked quickly out. Alex and I held our breath and looked at each other. "We can't work in here," we said simultaneously.

I looked around for Penny, but not finding her, we started moving the apparatus outside: the table made of a 4x8 plywood sheet and two sawhorses, the plucker, the buckets for blood and entrails, and the cone. We were halfway finished when Penny came out of the house. "What's this?" she demanded. Alex got a look of fear on his face. I quailed inwardly, too. Penny angry is one of the scarier things life has to offer. She is not tall, but she is strong and she has a voice you can hear from the other end of Charlotte.

I walked over to her. "Penny, we can't work in there."

"Why not?" she demanded again.

"Because the sun has been shining on the chicken coop roof and warmed it up in there. The smell is awful, and the floor is slippery."

"I wanted all the mess in one place! That's how I had it planned out!" She had talked frequently during the previous several days about how she had it all figured out so that it was "user friendly" to get the chickens through the process. I felt bad for her.

"I know--but the last time we did this, it was so cold that we couldn't smell anything."

"Fine!" she snapped. "Let's not do it. It's too late in the day anyway!" She continued shouting. "I've had it! Just leave it alone! I don't want to do this any more!"

I just looked at her. "Penny, don't be like that. We're here, and I know it's late, but honestly I do my best. I have my own farm to run," I explained, feeling oddly guilty about that fact and resenting feeling guilty.

Alex said, "Let's get started."

We both turned and walked into the chicken coop and started hanging up ropes so we could dangle the chickens by their legs to make them sleepy & calm prior to killing them. Then we got some extension cords and hooked them up to the plucker and the scalder. I started catching chickens and hanging them up.

I first selected a mild white meat hen who was sitting unflappably (ha) on the ground like a forgotten white soccer ball.

She beat me up.

"Do like this!" said Alex, annoyed as only a teenager can be with my ignorance. He grabbed a chicken by the leg and used his forearm to shove its head down. As soon as the head pointed straight down, the wings stopped beating. Wrinkling my nose at the overwhelming stench now augmented by a close view of chicken anus, I took the chicken from him and tried to find a way to hold it by the legs, tie a string around them, and avoid being beaten or scratched. Somehow I managed it, but only because I was wearing the Vermont equivalent of a suit of armor. I tied the string to a nail in the roof and left the chicken to hang there. She flapped around a bit and then hung still.

I tried not to breathe as I picked up the next chicken. White feathers spotted with the chicken excrement/sawdust mixture. Flapping wings beating on me and flinging said mixture in every direction--on my clothes, my face, in my hair, sometimes in my eyes, and once, perilously close to my mouth. Claws scratching and clutching and digging into my hands (I had to leave my gloves off so I could tie the strings). I swore and stuffed her head down with my forearm, then tried to ignore what I had to touch and smell and see as I tied strings around the bird's legs. Another one done. I hung it up and looked for the next one.

I spotted another deceptively calm white hen, reached gently under her and grabbed a leg. Something squished between my fingers and I said involuntarily, "Ugh."

Alex glanced my way. "You all right?"

"Yeah, it's just disgusting. How did you and I end up getting stuck in here?"

He laughed. "I know."

Poetic justice, I guess, I thought as I pushed the hen's head down and started trying to get the baling twine around the shit-covered feet.

I heard intense squabbling behind me. "One down!" said Alex cheerfully, tossing a chicken head into a bucket. Now here is where you might want to close your eyes. I'll tell you when it's over--look below for bold lettering.

We both watched as the hen flapped around on the end of the string. Blood went everywhere, mixing with the chicken shit and sawdust slime on the ground, spattering our clothes and our faces.

"Maybe we should use the cone," I suggested.

"I don't know how to use that thing," said Alex. "At home, we have a chopping block and an axe. You grab a chicken, put it down and hold it stretched out. One chop and you toss the head one way and the chicken the other way. Somebody else grabs the chicken and keeps it from bruising itself."

"Ah," I said. "Penny doesn't have an axe."

"I know," said Alex, "I already asked her. And she doesn't have a chopping block, either." He looked at me, the gore-covered knife hanging dripping in his hand.

We watched with loathing as the chicken slowly stopped flapping around. Usually when a chicken is flapping around so much, you hear it screaming, "Buck, buck, buck, buck buuuuuuck!" It was weird to see this one making the same visual kerfuffle without the sound effects.

In the end a large puddle of blood lay shining on the wet, clay-like chicken shit floor. We left that chicken to drain out and I caught another while Alex killed the next one.

It's safe to read now.

This routine continued. I deliberately didn't watch whenever I knew Alex was making a cut. I noticed a metallic element to the odor.

After another 5 chickens, Alex said, "This knife is dull. I can't kill the chicken with one cut."

Stop reading again.

"What do you mean?" I asked. "Would it help to use the cone?"

'I doubt it." He started on the next chicken, and this time I watched to see what the problem was. What I saw made me almost sick enough to vomit.

Alex stretched out the chicken's neck, sliced at it, and opened up an artery. He made another cut, and then started to hack, and it took maybe three more hacks to get the chicken's head off.

"I'm sorry!" he said, noticing my face. "It's this stupid knife!"

He looked as upset as I felt. "Here, let me have it," I said. "It's not your fault."

"I know, but I hate doing it like this!"

It's safe again.

"Can I try one?" It was Alex's little cousin, watching through a window.

"NO," said Alex, firmly. "You stay out of here." He sounded so much like a kid talking to a youner relative that I wanted to tell him the same thing. But Alex comes from a tough family of chicken and turkey savvy Vermonters. His gruesome task may have bothered him, but he wouldn't lose sleep or have nightmares.

I, on the other hand.... But I wasn't going to indulge myself. Looking at the situation dispassionately, the chickens were just plain going to be losers today, more so than I would have liked. Penny was hurt and couldn't try to walk on the slime; James the expert chicken-killer was not available; Kathy was a grey-haired birdlike woman wearing a wool dress coat (no help there); our only other two helpers were my son Danny and Alex's ten-year-old cousin. I didn't want Danny even watching what was going on in the chicken coop, much less helping us. Furthermore, Penny was spending hundreds of dollars a week feeding her various animals. She couldn't do the work herself and so they either went hungry or she was relying on people like her neighbors to feed them, and Lord knows each one of us was maxxed out just trying to tread water. Turning those chickens into food, and doing it that day when Alex and I could be there to help, was the only intelligent choice to make. And I'm sorry, little chicken ghosts, that you couldn't die more gently.

The only comfort is that chickens are horrid creatures. A chicken is basically a limbic system with claws, feathers, and a beak. No higher-order thoughts exist in chickens' minds. They are pure impulse. Witness the fact that...

Cover your eyes again.

...the ones who were waiting to be chosen not only displayed no fear, but they were drawn to the already-dead chickens and pecked at their bloody necks and at the blood on the floor. They pulled on the gore hanging down from the severed necks, and I have to tell you that once I saw that, I got over my distress at the fact that we were killing the little bastards.

Okay, it's safe.

Time wore on slowly in that horrid, stench-filled coop. (I now understand why "cooped up" came into common useage to describe a claustrophobic feeling. It is truly awful. Chicken stench is second only to dog stench in obnoxiousness.) But there we were until the job was done: I grabbed, tied (sometimes Alex had a minute to help me tie the strings on), and hung, Alex did the same, but also cut them, and whenever his knife's edge wore down I went and sharpened it. After a little while I stuck the sharpener into my ski pants belt loop like a light sabre, then took the knife, wiped it on some snow outside, leaving a trail of gore, and then sharpened it and gave it back to Alex. He grabbed and tied whenever I did that.

About halfway through, I realized that the little red chickens among the white ones were difficult to catch. "We probably should catch these little guys before we can't crowd them in with the slower ones," I said. I snatched at one.

Air.

What the...? I could have sworn I had it's feet! I snatched again, and was again handily avoided. The next one left a tail feather in my hand. But finally I cornered one and caught it. It flapped and scratched and dug a sharp set of claws into my index finger, puncuring the skin and drawing blood. "Ick!" I said. Germy little cretan bird!

I handed him to Alex. "He's Next," I said.

He looked at me and laughed. "What'd he do?"

"He gave me a puncture wound."

"You better get a band-aid," said Alex.

"Penny, you got band-aids?" I asked.

"What?" from outside.

"Never mind." I just wanted to finish and get the hell out of there.

So, grimly, we worked. The smell got worse as the manure was kicked up, flapped around, and mixed with blood and gore.

I hated every minute in that chicken coop. Usually, no matter how bad your minutes are, if somebody asked you, "Would you rather live those minutes or die a few minutes early and skip them?" most of us would say we prefer to live that life, our lives, at almost any given moment, even the painful moments. But that time in the chicken coop I would trade.

Finally, the last chicken was dead and hanging. We emerged into the dying sunlight for the next step--cleaning the birds.

Our table was set up in the middle of all the animal pens. The wind came through, and though the day was unusually warm (37F), wet hands became quickly extremely cold. But you could warm them up with each chicken.

Each chicken was first dunked in the hot water the scalder kept warm. Unfortunately, the scalder had a short, which meant that if you tried to put a chicken in it you got a shock. So Penny used the baling twine that was around each chicken's legs to dip it into the water and bob it up and down for a few minutes.

Then the chicken went to the plucker: a machine that looked rather like a music box, and worked on the same principle, except the drum was of course much larger--the size of a toaster oven--and the little knobs sticking off of the wheel were rubbery spirals. The wheel spun rapidly and somebody would hold a chicken by the legs and let is ride along on the vibrating rubber thingies, turning it and adjusting it so that the rubber thingies could drag the feathers out by the follicles.

After the de-feathering, the chicken came to the table to be "cleaned." First, you cut a slit on the right side of the neck as it faces you, and take out a little pouch full of food that was attached to the skin at what you might think of as the chicken's shoulder. Then you flip the bird around and cut horizontally just above the anus, or about and inch and a half up from the tail (the bird is lying on its back). Then you reach in and grab the entrails and pull, trying not to break them and you pull them out in a big gobby mess. That's when your hands get warmed up.

The innards should end up lying on the table attached still to the bird at the anus. You cut that out and discard the tail and whatever entrails you don't need for soup.

Danny enjoyed this part. I gave him a whole set of entrails and he examined and dissected everything he found: kidneys, liver, lungs, heart, spleen, and gizzard. "I found the left ventricle!" he would say, or "What's this called?" holding up the spleen oozing its green pigmented fluid.

Just as the sun was going down, we finished, shivering and exhausted. I had taken one break to go home and get Mikey. I tried to eat a little before I went back, but although I was hungry, all food looked like the product of horrible processes, and I couldn't stomach anything except a few carrots.

We gathered up the hose, disposed of the entrails, threw the bad chicken carcasses to the wildlife (those with infections or that were otherwise uneatable), put the plucker on the porch, and got out of there. I felt by then like Dante escaping from the lowest pit of the Inferno.

At home, I wanted a drink, but I had to feed my horses and Cow. I was shivering as I went back out to the barn and gave out grain, hay, and water. I also felt contaminated with chicken blood. Danny stoked the fire and Mikey started emptying the dishwasher. I had two cases of chicken carcasses with me for cutting up and freezing, so after dinner and after the children were in bed, I came back downstairs and started cutting the birds into pieces for freezing.

I did about ten of them before my hands started to swell up. I had a few painful cuts that needed soap and water and a night's rest to fight the rampant bacteria that was in them. So I poured ice over the chickens that were in the house, made sure the lid was secure on the ones that were outside, got a class of wine, and finally sat down on the sofa with my laptop. I chatted with an old friend for a while, then gave it up and fell into a reddish-tinged sleep in which the images of the day flickered across my mind and made me jump awake a few times.

I went and listened to my children breathe, trying to put it all into place somehow. Death in life, life in death. I feel the dot from the ying and yang image in my own chest, the tension of death and life and how I live on the edge of a blade, pulled both ways, for the brief time that God inhales once and then I wave to my carefully balanced children as I finally fall.

I found my glasses and went back to bed with a book. As I lay in bed I heard the coyotes start singing, probably over in that big meadow I like to gallop across and where if I ever fall off, people will not find me unless they know me really well. Why are they singing? I wondered. Must be a rabbit.

An owl hooted. "Who cooks, who cooks, who cooks for yoooooouuuuuu," he sang, with a dying fall. If music be the food of love, play on, I thought, ridiculously, not knowing that the next day I would find in the driveway the duck's carcass that he had eaten only the head off of, in his fastidious, owl-like way. Owls like brains and they like what they can reach down a carcass's neck--that's all. I wish they would invite the bobcats for dinner, at least, instead of leaving so much to go to waste.

After a long while I fell into another restless sleep that lasted until morning.

a bit of the daily

2009-02-06T14:41:00.003-05:00

So far today: fed and watered all the horses, then put the hose away. Took about an hour and a half. Went to Mikey's class and helped with a big project. Got to know some of the other children in the class. The boys in this class are kind & intelligent. Mikey and I talked some with Isaac about how his family handled the recent death of his grandfather. I helped Owen make a hay rack and helped Mikey with his cleaning up.

Home to rearrange the horses so that Moon & Beauty could have a little time outside. Moon is a stud, so this is tricky. Can't let him near any mares, especially mares in heat. He was quite well behaved this morning and I put him in the ring with Teddy and Cow. Moon seems to like Cow.

Got an email from a friend & so had to go and pick up some stuf that belonged to me. Now that's all in the car and needs to be unloaded, sorted, and cleaned. It's saddles, bridles, saddle pads, boots, jodhpurs, lead ropes, halters, buckets, feeding tubs, a big wagon, a pony harness, and so on. It's good to have it back at home here.

In 1/2 hour I go to meet the boys at the bus stop, spend a little time with them, and then go to pick up Alex at his house so we can get hay and start cleaning and organizing the tack. We also need to ride.

Then I'll be taking Alex home and starting dinner. Not sure how to do both at the same time. After that, the boys & I will relax in front of the fire and watch Lost on abc.com.

No time, really, to ride, but if I see an opportunity I will take it.

Bella Healthy

2009-02-01T17:44:00.002-05:00

Bella is the big horse nipping at a fly. You can't see her real well, but you can at least see that she isn't bony.

She's a great horse to ride bareback when she's at the right weight.

A (Hopefully) Rare Visit to the Soapbox

2009-02-01T15:39:00.007-05:00

Rather than spending her time gathering money to pay for Bella's and Rosie's vet fees and giving my friend back her board money, the owner of the farm the two horses were staying at has decided to go on a mud-slinging campaign against yours truly. Every unfounded rumour spread by horse people (horse people are a catty lot, go figure) is being spread about me now.

It doesn't matter very much. Anybody who owns a horse is going to have another person who owns a horse saying nasty things about them. And everybody who owns horses has friends who think they're great. The same is true here. The owner of that farm has many happy clients and many people learning excellent skills from her. And the horses that I saw at her farm yesterday, when I went to check while I was deciding whether or not to report her to the police, were on the thin side, but basically fine. I think Rosie and Bella were unlucky because they are special: in Rosie's case, she is an enormous horse (a Percheron) who eats surprising amounts of hay, and in Bella's case, she was, until a few weeks ago, a nuring mother. Just try nourishing a growing foal without becoming a bag of bones.

However, no matter how you look at it, the two horses came away from her stable undernourished and neglected. Either they are both sick, in which case the stable owner ought to have noticed, or they were not fed enough. It seems unlikely that both horses would be sick enough to drop hundreds of pounds over the course of the last few months without other horses being infected or without any other symptoms. The vet hasn't been here yet, but I think we will discover that they become well with a simple course of adequate nutrition.

The moral of the story: If you have a horse at a stable, be careful in these hard times, because perfectly decent people are cutting corners and are missing things (like that two out of the twenty-five or so horses at the facility are not doing well). You have to watch out for your own horses, no matter how much you are paying to have them cared for or how prestigious the barn is. (The barn in question has enjoyed a decent reputation, with only the normal amount of rumours surrounding it, up until now.)

The stable owner messed up. She is not a bad person, but she made a mistake, and it has hurt two innocent creatures and the people who love them. Other good people will make mistakes during hard times. We all need to support each other, but also when we do mess up we have to admit it and try to make amends.

From here on in, my focus is to get Bella and Rosie back to their glistening, happy, radiant selves.

Poor Horse

2009-02-01T13:53:00.002-05:00

2009-02-01T13:44:00.005-05:00

I am so upset that I had nightmares last night about yesterday's events. My friend and neighbor brought her two horses, Bella, who has been here before, and Rosie, who was with Bella at another stable, back to Chiron's Grove. They had been gone since last summer, when my friend brought them to her house so that Bella could be there when she foaled. Subsequently, she moved Bella and Rosie over to another stable.

Here's what happened.

My friend and I walked up to the end of the driveway to lead the horses down from the trailer. The stable owner and her mother were parking up there as we walked up. They opened the back of the trailer and the door flew open. We could see the two blanketed horse's rears. The stable owner walked up to the front of the trailer and undid the lead ropes (both of them!) and then backed Bella out. Bella knows how to back out of a trailer, so she did fine. Then Bella swung around and faced me, and my jaw fell open. She was gaunt and glassy-eyed.

I gasped. "She's awfully skinny," I said in an undertone to my friend.

Just then Rosie, who is a big black 3-year-old Percheron, tried to turn around in the trailer and half backed, half fell as she tried to get out. She slipped, reared right up over my head, and started to flail as I jumped out of the way. Her body suddenly came slamming down right where I had been standing. "How did she get loose?" I snapped, now twice annoyed. Nobody said anything, but clearly the stable owner had untied both horses and then left Rosie unattended in the trailer while she backed Bella out.

Fortunately, Rosie seems to be okay. "Seems" is an important word because horses are delicate and can crash later if their stomachs get twisted after a fall like that. I'm happy to say that we have seen no problems so far.

My friend and I led the horses down the driveway, and I said, "I'm really surprised by how Bella looks. Look at her neck! She has no fat deposits along the top of it." My friend said she wanted to take their blankets off and having a look at them, but her daughter was at home sick so she couldn't stay. She saw them settled and happy in the paddock with the other horses, but then she had to leave.

I went into the house for my camera. I kept thinking about how very skinny Bella looked, but it was scary to go out there and remove her blanket. I knew it would be bad. Finally I had worked up my nerve and went back outside.

Camera in hand, Elizabeth and I started unbucking the blankets. When we removed Bella's we both gasped. What we saw is in the next post. And from then on, the day was a blur. First, Bella and Rosie obviously needed food. They drank about ten gallons of water between them. Then we brought Bella (who was in the worst condition, though both horses look terrible) in and gave her some grain. Both are now on a diet of lots of grain & hay, with grain every six hours and hay around the clock.

And I called the stable owner. I'll spare you the details of the conversation, but in the end I went to her barn and inspected every horse on the property, taking off many of their blankets and checking that they had clean water. All of them look a bit underweight, but none look as bad as Bella or Rosie. Bella and Rosie have good reason to be thinner, though. Bella just finished nursing a foal, and Rosie is huge and requires more food than most horses.

The stable owner has so far not taken responsibility for what happened. She has many excuses, none of them convincing. She has not offered to give my friend her money back. My friend reported her to the police and I am waiting for them to come here to see Bella and Rosie. My friends have also notified reporter friends of theirs.

Beauty's Bag Last Night vs. This Morning

2009-01-30T13:45:00.002-05:00

Horses at Chiron's Grove Part I: Chiron's Foxtrot

2009-01-30T11:55:00.005-05:00

This is Chiron's Foxtrot. He's half Saddlebred, half Morgan. He is just learning how to be ridden. Obedient, flashy, engaged, smart, respectful of people. Dominant in the herd. Loves to play with babies and ponies. Chestnut with white blaze and white snip on his nose. Has a powerful, ground-covering extended trot that he can maintain for hours. I want to use him for endurance, but several people are interested in him. I'd like to see him go to Tina, who is an excellent trainer and will take good care of him. We're working out the details and hopefully can make it happen. But if that doesn't work out, I really want to ride him in the April Mud Ride, a 15-mile competitive trail ride. There are two days for that ride so I want to take two horses, and it would be great if he could be one of them.

Alex

2009-01-27T03:55:00.000-05:00

We have a new trainer at Chiron's Grove, Alex Coyle. Alex has studied horse training with Clinton Anderson and Pat Parelli. He is an avid and highly successful Gymkhana rider, though he rides not only Western, but English and some dressage as well. He has successfully trained dozens of horses and also made his mark as somebody to go to if you want to find a mount to suit your needs. He has a knack for matching people with horses.

Alex's stallion, Moon, is a gorgeous, well balanced, gentle registered paint champion. He is homozygous black, meaning he will never throw a red offspring. He is currently standing at stud here at Chiron's Grove.

Currently Alex is working on training our horses, but he will also be available to train other people's horses here at our training facility.

We are excited to be working with him. He has already begun whipping this place into shape and helping to stuff the barn full of hay. There is never a dull moment around him.

Missing the Children

2009-01-24T08:15:00.000-05:00

It's one of those "long haul" times when the children are with their father for 5 days. I miss them. Marc allows phone calls only at 6:30 Thursday and Sunday nights. I keep thinking about them, though.

Poor Mustang

2009-01-23T12:56:00.001-05:00

He's aching pretty much, according to the vet. He's very sore behind the withers, possibly from that fox-hunt where he got out of the trailer by backing underneath the butt bar and smacked his withers pretty hard. Also, he has a triceps muscle that isn't in great shape, and that is probably what Cordell found when he was shoeing him. He's on r&r for about a month. Randy (the vet) did an adjustment on his back that seemed to help his soreness on top. He massaged the sore muscle and taught me how to do some stretches.

Bad news: no riding Rocket for a while. Good news: I have other horses to ride and they will benefit.

Isis

2009-01-19T08:48:00.000-05:00

Isis, daughter of Scotland's Golden Moon Beam, arrived this past Thursday. Some of you remember when her sire died. We didn't know that Bella was pregnant until after he was gone. His daughter was born 4 months ago. She, like him, is a palomino. She looks exactly like him!

Pictures to come.

Scrub-a-dub-dub, three--wha?

2009-01-18T23:47:00.000-05:00

By the time the sun set tonight, the ducks were on a downward spiral. They drank a little, but then went back to huddling down on the ground trying to keep themselves warm under their feathers. It's hard to see a duck's feet on the cold hard snow in winter without shivering oneself. I walked over and picked one up--no objection. I carried him into the house and put him in the bathtub. He began to drink the tepid water even before I set him down on it! I went back out for the other male, and then picked up the smaller female and brought her in with her friends. Look at the water shaking around them! I could hear their claws on the bottom of the tub going clickety clickety clack as they paddled for no real reason. Their eyes were wide open, unlike when they were outside wincing. They began softly to talk to each other, little chirpish squeezebox-like caressing syllables comparing their happiness at having suddenly found themselves in Heaven.

Muscovie ducks originated near Moscow. However did they get through those harsh winters? Nature has no mercy, no commitment to making an individual of a species happy as well as able to procreate before she dies.

What about us humans? Are we like Muscovie ducks able to survive a harsh environment with misery as a daily diet and survival the best goal? Does our fate differ from country to country or habitat to habitat?

Maybe that's why so many cultures have stories about a paradise lost. Maybe we all carry a sense that at some point we will be picked up from the harsh cold that has us cringing and calling up our best resources to bear it and placed in someplace with warmth and plenty and a cessation of misery.

Many of us see death as the magic messenger that frees us and shows us the way to Paradise. Some of us strive to detach, to cease wanting, to "live in the moment," because only by taking moments one by one can we bear them at all. It's almost like we were not meant to bear life, but we must, and to survive it (as it were) we must place ourselves in blinders so that it doesn't come at us all at once. Maybe that's why we invented time, the ordering of events, so that we could bear the weight of life.

I envied the ducks today. As I carried them I realized that my mittens had gotten layered over and over with dampness from trying to water the livestock and let them drink their fill before their buckets froze over. Each layer of dampness froze without drying, until my hands were each encased in balls of ice. Oddly, my insulating ice balls were warmer than the air around me!

Not long after, a friend pulled into the driveway and got out of her car and dug right into the task of comforting our frozen friends of the outdoors. She held gates for me, helped me break hay bales open and keep track of the twine, encouraged the 4-month-old filly to follow the herd to the barn, lifted heavy buckets up high enough so that the precious water would not be kicked over before it froze into a block of ice. Our lungs hurt and our tears froze on the rims of our eyes before they had a chance to evaporate (or fall). Our chins locked us into odd word formations as the muscles in our faces stiffened. I did not expect my friend, but she came to see how we were all doing. Her presence was to me what my gentle lifting hands were to my ducks. She showed me a warmth and sustenance in her caring companionship.

Maybe that's all any of us can do. I lift ducks, my friend lifts me. I lift my children, and they someday will probably find themselves astonishingly lifting both their parents. My neighbors are grieving and I bring them home-made pasta. I have shoulder surgery and my friends feed the horses. It's all the same.

It's all about helping other beings find Paradise.

Horse Doings

2009-01-05T22:34:00.000-05:00

Rocket: doing five miles per day. In great shape, but gets sweaty. Needs a trim so he can cool better. We should be ready on competition day (January 24th, 25 mile competitive trail ride).

Jack: Starting to look more like an adult pony. Just too cute. Loves to play with Rocket.

Memphis: Doesn't have enough to do. I need to find a rider for her. Any small people who are good riders out there? She can carry up to 120 lbs easily and actually does fine with a little more. We had her pulling a sled the other day. She seemed to love it. And the kids? Well, look at their faces.

Dante: Limping. Probably another abscess. He is with Cocoa over at Clark's right now.

Cocoa: Beautiful. Hasn't been worked in about a month & so has the Ali attitude again.

Ed: Did a nice job on a trail ride the other day. Four miles mostly at a jog. What an easy horse to ride! Needed a firm hand to keep moving, though. Balked for Van.

Meg: That girl has so much potential! Loves her trail rides. Needs to work on organization such as breathing with her footfalls and keeping her middle straight when she canters (she goes all sort of diagonal and bendy when she canters).

The rest of us:

Mikey is sleeping beside me. Has plans for the morning, wants me to wake him up at 6 when I get up. Got a new PSP game for his trip to Montreal next week. Cracked me up earlier today trying to find reasons I shouldn't stop to chat with people when I meet them out & about the world.

Danny was happy to be home but got cranky pretty quickly & maybe didn't have a good dinner because he needed one. Who knows--he's a pre-teen and the way they take on food is jaw-dropping (for me, too). He had a smoothie & a kid cuisine.

Lucy: tried to go on our ride today but got tired by the time we were at Magic & Alan's & Elizabeth's. She snoozed with them until I came back for her.

Shadow: actually did go along for the ride. Tried to take a short cut by going through Lewis Creek! I couldn't stop Rocket quickly enough & when I finally did & we went back poor Shadow had swum through the fast, icy, swollen creek to the side we were on, then hove himself out while I watched helplessly from the road. His little head sticking up out of the water was one of the most touching things.... But after all he did it & was fine.

Mimoka: went home with Van. All five of her.

Midnight: doing better. Has only Shadow to play with but seems pretty happy to be dragged around and mauled by a big slobbery puppy.

We lost one duck the other day. Sad. The poor thing got locked in the grain room & I'm not sure how long it was in there. Maybe two days. I found it only after it was weak from hunger & thirst. It was too late, though. It didn't recover & was dead by morning. I feel terrible for it.

Me: I have a cold. Going to sleep.

Mikey's funny thing today

2009-01-05T22:31:00.000-05:00

Mikey: Mommy, why do you have to chat with people every time you stop to pick something up?
Me: Because it's good manners.
Mikey: Sulkily. Why do we have to have good manners?
Me: Because good manners are the oil of society.

Pause.

Mikey: Why does society need oil?

Mikey said I have to write this

2008-12-30T17:41:00.000-05:00

Today I gave Mikey a hug. I said, "I love you, Mikey, bye."

He said, "I love you Mommy, when are you going to brush your teeth? You have bad breath."

And Mikey thought that was quite funny, and he made me promise to put it on the blog among "guess what Mikey/Danny said today" type blog entries.

So here it is. Thanks, Mikey.

Pretend This is Fiction

2008-12-22T13:24:00.000-05:00

Hoofbeats in New Haven is no longer viable, thanks to some truly bizarre developments. Apparently federal court action is happening somewhere around that property and we are needing to walk away to avoid entanglement in a very messy situation. I wish I could explain more, but until I know what's safe for me to talk about I shall remain mum.

The most devastating development was the impact on Cordell of the whole thing. He was living in the barn already and at one point the seller/landlord illegally locked up his living space and his stuff. He had to gain (legal) access to retrieve his belongings, and is now staying with relatives. Two things keep me awake at this point: reviewing how this might have been easier on Cordell especially but also other people impacted by the drama, and reliving my helplessness when we were threatened with lawsuits if we dared to retrieve our last remaining horse, Cocoa, who wouldn't get on the stock trailer when I brought the others to a safer location. A brief change of the landlord's heart gave Cordell the opportunity to take Cocoa to a kind neighbor's horse farm, and that best of all possible neighbors has been caring for him during the chaos of the last few days while we re-calibrate our plans. The other horses are all safe and happy at yet another friend's house while we decide where we will all land.

Unfortunately, after we told our present landlord that we were moving, he found renters for this house, who have already packed their boxes and await the end of the month to move in here.

The children? Oblivious. They are happy with the snow storm and with Christmas coming up. Our halfway moved-out status is to them great fun, because with a mattress in the living room (reasons Mikey) we have every chance of catching Santa at it when he puts the presents under the tree! Life couldn't be better, and don't anybody dare suggest putting the mattress back in the bedroom where it belongs. This is just too much fun. Danny, too, is cheerful, working hard to do his part in the overall team that helps to run his life.

Thank you, Elizabeth, Rachelle, Tina, Jessica, Clark, Suzanne, Michael, Cordell(!), Sally, Vernon, Vikie(!), Frosty, Dad, Mom, Mikey, Danny, and above all, my dear, dear Van for everything you've done to minimize the impact of this unexpected turn of events. Because of you all, I'm sure it will all come out very well.

Danny and Mikey, You Have GOT to See This!

2008-12-13T22:11:00.000-05:00

Just click on the title. I laughed myself silly last night when I saw this. Just ask Van. Actually, come to think of it, he was laughing himself silly, too. So come to think of it yet again, let me know when you're getting ready to watch this, because I want to see you laugh yourselves silly.

News in brief: Tina and I worked with Cocoa today and it went well. He was well mannered and interested and did his best. Also Jessica and I showed off Memphis to some potential buyers. I liked the people very much. They are a show home, and that is essential for Memphis, busy, intelligent girl that she is.

Too tired for more, but maybe will get some Celebrate Memphis pictures up on the blog tomorrow.

Breakfast with Danny the Day Before His Birthday

2008-12-13T00:24:00.000-05:00

Now, Pri, don't CRY.

Some barn photos

2008-12-12T18:48:00.000-05:00

This is the entrance to the new barn.

It has a laundry room.

This is the bathroom, complete with shower.

Below is the tack room, kept separated from the humidity of the barn by a glass door.

About Embedding Dad's Video

2008-12-10T21:23:00.000-05:00

...and this is how you embed that video, Dad.

Dad's video

2008-12-10T20:00:00.000-05:00

Hoofbeats Equestrian Center

2008-12-07T08:09:00.000-05:00

We're beginning a journey. I can hardly believe that a childhood dream that was always just too wonderful to hope for is actually unfolding in my life.

I'll be spending some time this morning improving the web site. You can watch the adventure unfold by checking in there often.

Consignment Shop

2008-12-07T08:00:00.000-05:00

This is turning into a rather popular idea. Click on the title of the link to see the page on our web site that talks about it. Mom and Vernon said last night that with enough notice they can watch the shop every now & then. Stephen and Vicki are thinking of putting a meat freezer there for their home-grown meat products.

AAAAAAHHH!

2008-12-07T07:50:00.000-05:00

Most of the time when you tell a story about something that happened suddenly, you can say, "I was walking along when suddenly..." or "Everything was peaceful and quiet when all of a sudden...," but when you are sound asleep, and something sudden happens, it feels like there was no world at all, no you, nothing to pin you to time, before the startling event.

"AAAAAAAAHHH!!!!" out of nowhere, from nothingness, and suddenly, I am awake and trying to fill out the edges of a pinpoint of knowledge, that Danny had yelled in his sleep.

From my muzziness, all I could do was say, "Danny, Danny, it's Mommy. You're safe in your own bed." It was all I knew myself. Then conciousness coalesced. I got out of bed and went to sit on the edge of his bed.

"Are you all right?"

"Huh?"

"You just yelled. Are you all right?"

"I yelled?"

"Um, yes. Did you have a scary dream?"

"No, it just startled me." Ah. Danny's startle reflex is legendary in our household. He sometimes throws whatever he has in his arms up into the air and yells like he's being pinched, hard.

"Well, you're safe. Do you want to come into my bed?"

"Yes." He walked blearily to my bed, crawled under the covers, and immediately sank into a deep sleep. I don't even know if he'll remember that.

Mikey never even stirred.

We are now at the new Hoofbeats Blog.

2008-12-05T15:39:00.000-05:00

Which is here.

Home from School

2008-12-05T15:34:00.000-05:00

(Required reading background: Eragon, Eldest, Brisingr, or any of the Harry Potter books.)

Me: Danny, do you have a black eye?

Danny: I don't think so--oh, yeah, Mikey accidentally healed me last night.

Me: Mikey, please don't heal your brother any more.

Mikey: Wouldn't you rather have a black eye than a hurt arm?

At this point, we've entered that weird universe of dialog with children. You need a willing suspension of comprehension to survive there.

Whose Blog is this, anyway?

2008-11-20T21:38:00.000-05:00

Our new farm name is "Hoofbeats." Hoofbeats Equestrian Center, to be exact. We've been working on the logo and I asked Dad (who is in China and blogs here) what "hoofbeats" is in Chinese. Well, here it is:

It translates literally to "Horse bottom of foot voice."

Wow.

And Xu Li showed us some handbags. Dad was the model.

Lucy Went Missing

2008-11-15T21:52:00.000-05:00

Lucy and Shadow came outside with me this morning when I fed the horses. But I did not take them to the Meadow. Instead, I left them at the door where they could stay dry if they wanted to.

When I came back, there was Shadow at the door. But no Lucy. I looked everywhere. At least I thought I did. I looked downstairs in the basement, and upstairs in all the bedrooms, and downstairs in every room, and even in the stalls in the barn to see if she had gotten stuck in with one of the horses or with the cow or in the empty stall. No Lucy. So I went and got Rocket and got on him and rode off looking for her. It was raining, and although I had planned to ride last night, when I saw the weather this morning I had decided against going. But Lucy missing is a serious event and so off I went in the rain.

Riding in the rain is fun once you get into it. You do have to dress right. You have to have wool on one of your outer layersand you have to have a bunch of layers. When you walk outside, if you can feel "weather" anywhere on your body, you have to turn right back around and go inside and add yet another layer, or a scarf, or a hat, or gloves, or whatever. But having done all that, you can have a lovely riding experience. Horses don't mind the wet. Sometimes, I'm pretty sure they like it. Having watched my horses for a while, I have come to believe that they mind heat and sun much more than they do a nice long downpour.

Rocket and I trotted down the road and encountered three separate vehicles with hunters in them. You can spot a hunters vehicle from a half-mile away. It is usually a beat up jalopy, and as they get closer you can see one head in the driver's side, one head in the passenger side, and usually another silhouette of one or more heads in the back seat. Then when you get level with the car you see that it is stuffed full of burly men. None of them has shaved in a long time. They all have dark tans and startling pale eyes. And usually at least one tooth missing. I have no idea why this is the case. I'm very sorry to all you hunters out there who tell me that you have excellent teeth, no tan at all, and hunt all by yourself. I'm just telling you what my experience is. Each one of the vehicles stopped and at each one I was greeted with a quasi-toothless grin.

I have to admit, these hunters scare me. They look inappropriately gleeful and when I see that, I think of alcohol and guns and cars all in combination. Then throw in the fact that I am on horseback on a road where many of these hunters go by every day. Having said that, everybody that I saw and talked to was very nice. And since they were cruising up and down our dirt roads, I figured they would be pretty good at spotting Lucy. If they didn't hit her first.

No luck from the hunters, though. Just as one of the vehicles pulled away, Rocket tensed and looked off to the left. I peered through the trees to see what he was looking at. It was a herd of deer. The car that I had just left coasted forward to the next driveway, backed into it, and came back towards me. They stopped and looked at the deer. I trotted back to them.

"Just so you know," I said. "Last year, somebody willshot a deer right here in this road. Those deer go across this road all the time. But you should have seen the woman who lives in that house." I indicated the house near the field where the deer were. "I thought she was going to kill somebody."

Expressions within the car wavered between glee at what they thought might have been a funny story, and surprisingly, fear.

"So I would not advise you to try to shoot one of the deer that are in that field. I don't know what she'll do this year if somebody shoots a gun that close to her house."

They nodded sagely. As I trotted away, feeling a bit smug, I heard them turn the car around again and head back the way they had been going in the first place.

But of course, as I trotted down the road, I began to think about the possibility that Lucy had been shot.

Rocket is walking very nicely these days since Cordell trimmed his hooves and made a few adjustments to the shape of his foot. He's less choppy. He really did not want to pass the Meadow and keep going, but I pushed him across the covered bridge and to Elizabeth, Magic, and Allen's house, looking in the woods all the way for Lucy. When I got there, I rang the doorbell and Elizabeth came out, followed a little while later by magic. Elizabeth offered to come over and help look for Lucy. Magic was on her way to a riding lesson but said she would watch the road as she went.

So Rocket and I went home through the woods, me a little bit nervous (and yes, Mom, I know you're nervous now too), and Rocket in a bit of a hurry. The paths there are winding and narrow and have many overhanging branches, so I practiced some of the bareback moves like ducking under branches (it's kind of fun: you close your eyes and hug your horse's neck and rely on him to carry you forward) and leaning into turns just exactly when his shoulder and foreleg were ready for me to. He seems to enjoy threading his way between trees that grew closely together.

Rocket swam across the creek. And then I discovered another advantage of bareback riding: when your horse is getting ready to go deep into a creek, you just pull your feet up and perch on top of him, and then you will not get water in your boots.

So, although I was worried for our lives and Lucy's, still, we had a pleasant ride through the woods and home. Elizabeth was there, but she said that although she went into the house, she didn't find Lucy there. I was disappointed. I had hoped that Lucy would come back to the house on her own.

I took care of Rocket and then Elizabeth and I talked about what to do next. She said, "did you check down in the basement?" I said that I had, but I hadn't checked the laundry room. I said, "I have never known Lucy to go into the laundry room and I can't imagine why she would, but I suppose I will just doublecheck."

I went into the house and took off my boots and walked around and down into the basement. No Lucy. The laundry room was dark. I switched on the light and looked at the pile of laundry. One of the towels raised its head.

"Lucy!" I said, joyfully. She lumbered to her feet and greeted me as happily as I greeted her. "I found her!" I called to Elizabeth.

Everybody celebrated: me, Elizabeth, Shadow, even Mimoka. We had a little dance party in the kitchen. I made tea and Elizabeth and I drank tea and planned Danny's special day next Sunday. (And yes, Danny, I can tell that you're interested now even if you weren't before). We decided that hot cider, hot chocolate, cider donuts, and Apple pie would be in order.

Then we chatted about my lunch with Scott yesterday. We talked about the horses, and our dogs, and the party that Elizabeth was going to tonight for somebody at her work. The rain pitter pattered outside and the tea was warm on our hands and steamy in our noses and comforting as we sipped it.

These are the moments, I thought. These are the moments that a busy life obliterates. And I vowed to myself always to have time to have tea with friends.

So Danny, obviously you will be wanting to know what exactly is up for next Sunday.

But that is for later...

2008-11-15T07:37:00.000-05:00

As if I needed evidence of Rocket's general willingness to do the right thing and to be helpful, he has started doing this thing that I find absolutely adorable. A couple of weeks ago I used a bucket to get on him. I placed it next to him and then stood on it. He stepped sideways and nearly knocked me right off of it.

I wondered if perhaps he was trying to line himself up. We do that against fences and rocks and logs sometimes and I have been working on giving him cues about exactly where to stand so I can get on easily.

And he did it again yesterday. I had put a bridle at him (with a bosal this time) while we were in his stall. I brought a bucket in and set it next to him in exactly the right place to get on him. I got up on the bucket and he stepped sideways to get closer to me, again knocking me off my balance. It was wrong, but also very cute. I could see that he wanted to get me on top of his back, so he stepped sideways thinking that that would transfer me from being next to him to being top of him.

So I adjusted the bucket and let him know that I was amused and that he needed to do something slightly different. When he got truly lined up exactly where I wanted him I praised him and told to stand still. He did, and I scrambled up onto his back (getting on bareback is an awkward process for me while I try to do it using just my left arm).

Riding Bareback

Gawani Pony Boy takes riding bareback seriously, and writes about it in his book Horse, Follow Closely. Also, Stacy Westfall is amazing. I have included this video before, but for those of you who haven't seen it, this is definitely worth seeing.

Unfortunately, in Competitive Trail Riding, a saddle must be used. I don't know about endurance riding. But for pleasure riding and general trail riding bareback is an excellent choice. So below, I've summarized some of the things that I know about bareback riding. I learned to ride bareback rather than with a saddle, and I have been riding bareback since I was seven years old.

Relax -- It may seem counterintuitive, because when you're riding bareback you want to hang on with your legs. But this is a mistake. When you hang on with your legs, you transmit tension and stress to the horse and also up your body. It puts you out of sync with your horse's movements and eliminates the wonderful shock absorption powers of your waist. So if you're having a choppy ride bareback, relax. Relax your legs (stop hanging on) and loosen your waist; imagine that your whole lower half from your waist down is part of your horse. Your other half, from your waist up, floats above your horse. When you ride bareback, you can even relax your posture a bit

Turns -- Turns are much nicer when you ride bareback. If your horse turns suddenly to the left, for example, when you're riding in a saddle, your weight gets thrown to the right. I don't know exactly why this happens, but when you ride bareback and your horse makes a sudden turn to the left, your body tends to flow more naturally with the horse. This means that your horse has a much easier time turning.

Courage -- Saddles feel more safe. They feel like they hold you on. And actually, they do, when they are working properly. Western saddles especially are designed to help you keep your seat. So it takes a certain amount of courage to ride without saddle. On the other hand, saddles are dangerous. Your safety depends on your equipment working properly, no matter how good a rider you are. But when you ride bareback, it is you and the horse. No cinches can break, no stirrups can fly off your feet leaving you frantically adjusting your seat to compensate, and if you do fall, you fall cleanly.

Trotting -- The myth is that trotting is less comfortable without a saddle. Now, this varies from horse to horse, but I have found that trotting is more comfortable, not less, when you ride bareback. This connects back to what I said about relaxation and courage, but if you are relaxed on your horse then you can have a very smooth and comfortable sitting trot.

Posting -- Most people don't know that you can post even when you ride bareback. Posting happens because one side of your horse's rump rises as his rear leg on that side moves forward. That action moves you up and forward a little bit -- the beginning of the post. And then, the rump on the other side is up and forward. When you post bareback, you don't go up and down, a you go sort of side to side and front to back. The little bit of up-and-down that you do is very closely connected to your horse's up-and-down. Again, it is essential to have a relaxed torso and upper legs for this to work.

Cantering -- Cantering and galloping bareback are wonderful. If you are relaxed, you will feel like you are floating. The only disadvantage to cantering and galloping bareback is stopping. The one thing that I don't like about cantering bareback is that for some horses, cantering means feeling spooky or it many horses are more likely to jump sideways when they are cantering. This is very hard to handle without saddle to help you. Even so, I have been on many horses that jumped sideways at a canter and stayed on just fine. I'm not sure what my body does when my horse's body communicates fear, but whatever it is, it's very quick and usually effective. I've learned to trust myself.

Slowing down -- the most difficult transition in bareback riding (and in fact riding with any kind of tack) is slowing down from the canter or gallop to a trot. I have still not completely mastered this. However, I am learning that leaning back with your lower half when you feel a slowdown coming -- or even to communicate to your horse that you want to slow down -- is a really good idea. This is hard to describe, but picture yourself leaning backwards up to your torso and leaning slightly forward above that. Grabbing on hard with your legs usually throws your top half forward and then you end up grabbing hold of the mane and stiffening even more to keep from flying over your horse's head. This is instinctive, but absolutely the worst thing you could do. It rattles your teeth and throws you up into the air, and then you want to grab even harder and a nasty cycle begins and only ends when you and your horse become sensible enough to get back into sync with one another. For many horses, grabbing on with your legs signals that they should speed up again, and if you're also hauling on the reins to slow them down they can become confused. Then it feels like their four feet suddenly explode out into four different directions, stiffening at the same time, like four stiff machine-like pistons. This is the opposite of what you want. I will write more about this as I learn.

The essence of riding in general, but especially riding bareback, is that you and your horse are one being -- a centaur. Rather than thinking about instructions such as the above as separate pieces of information to employ individually, keep in the front of your mind an image of you and your horse together as a centaur. Think of the energy flowing around your horse and you as uniting you both into a single creature: one creature with a single point of balance, a single focus of thought, wrapped within and held together by love.

Missing My Boys

2008-11-14T08:18:00.000-05:00

Every two weeks occurs what I call "the long haul." It is a stretch of five days when the boys are with their dad. I grit my teeth and put my head down and kind of plow through those five days because I miss them. I try to look at the bright side -- activities that I can do (like fox hunting and working and long, long trail rides) that are difficult when they're around. Sometimes that makes it all right but other times, I turn a corner in the house and see something (like Mikey's duffel bag, packed carefully with individually selected stuffed animals, each with a name), and I feel a sort of gap open up in my inner world, shaped exactly like Mikey or Danny.

Fortunately for the children, they have become used to this process and besides, they have a loving parent in the other household, so I don't think they have the same kind of experience. And that's fine. They shouldn't be feeling bad in either house, for any reason.

And the good news is, when they are here, everything is right and perfect.

Shadow

2008-11-12T12:57:00.000-05:00

Of Children and Puppies

2008-11-10T07:01:00.000-05:00

I need to say something about the children. When I write in this blog, I write about the horses, and the farm, but I don't say much about the children. The reason for that is that our lives are under an electron microscope right now for reasons that some of you know. Anything that I say can be used in ways that I didn't predict.

However, I kept journals about the children and their lives before our "public" image became an issue. And now, they have become interested in seeing the blog and I think they would enjoy reading about the adventures. So I'm going to revert to my old habits and include them in this blog.

So about the puppy... his name is Shadow. He is 12 weeks old and mostly black and he has a border collie sheltie mix.

On Saturday, Danny and I drove all the way to national and New Hampshire to get this puppy. Danny had no idea where we were going but he did know that it was to get his birthday present.

The ride to Nashua was pleasant. We brought along a bag of snacks and I fretted about the fact that we might not have enough room in the car for the "present." Sometimes, as we drove along, I felt like bursting with excitement. I wanted to talk to Danny about the puppy and it is not an easy thing for me to keep something like that secret. But the specter of Van was over my shoulder -- he is the conscience of our family when it comes to keeping secrets until it's time to reveal them. He becomes irritated when somebody blows a secret before it's time.

Horses have an energy field around them -- in fact the essence of "horseness” is not physical but energetic. Our job as riders and trainers is to combine our energy with our horses', or rather, to allow our energy to be combined with theirs, in ways that don't disturb the beauty of the combined energy.

It is the same with children. The difference is that we are of the same species in our energies blend very easily. Furthermore, children have a very complicated agenda when it comes to combining their energies with their parents'.

Danny has the sweetest energy and the most loving persona of any person I've ever met. Imagine what a treat it was, therefore, to spend seven hours in the car with him sharing the happiness of a birthday present. I glanced over at him occasionally and felt a surge of happiness each time I saw his expression of contentment and happiness.

Meanwhile, Mikey was having an excellent day at his friend Cole's house. When we picked him up on her way home, we brought the puppy into the house for everybody to see, and Mikey talked about what they did that day. He played in the barn and tried to catch some wild kittens. Imagine how fun that is when you're nine. The barn is filled with round bales and Mikey and cole played games on and around them.

And now we have shadows energy as part of our family. He is somewhat timid at this point. I think he must be the best named (good job, Danny) animal I've ever met. When we walk around, he shadows us -- stays exactly behind and to the left of somebody's right heel. He moves completely silently. I would describe it more as a glide. He is mostly black and it's easy to lose track of him. Even when I walk with him, it's like he disappears, because he's in my blind spot and so very silent.

So this weekend with the children has been one of opening up our lives to a new being. Even Lucy has opened up her heart to the new puppy. She calmly anchors him and has taught him already some of the routines of our family.

I guess we have just begun yet another new adventure.

(I'm still using Dragon NaturallySpeaking in and out of time to go back and check this. Will check it later but in the meantime if something sounds confusing, it's a "speako".)

Yesterday

2008-11-09T08:33:00.000-05:00

I held up a leash for the cashier to see. "My son got a new puppy today."

"That's exciting," she said, smiling.

I held up a package of paper bowls. "He's thirsty." She smiled again.

I held up a new pair of pants in boys' size 12/14. "He threw up all over my son." She laughed out loud.

I held up the towel. "And now we need a new seat cover." She continued to laugh.

Waking up

2008-11-09T07:35:00.000-05:00

HELLO, said my shoulder.

"Whatever," I said.

Vet Visit

2008-11-07T08:34:00.000-05:00

Burlington Equine has become a sports medicine organization. Randy came out and helped when the horses had strangles. I have a lot of respect for him. He also came out yesterday to evaluate all five of our taller equine herd members for "fitness" for the plans we have for them.

The star of the morning was Cocoa. Despite the concerns raised by one of the people who came out see him, he is completely sound. His vision is perfect, his hocks are fine, his back needed a single adjustment (already done) that Randy thinks will hold for a while. Cordell has been adjusting his feet slowly over time, and Randy thinks this is the correct strategy. Coco stood quietly for his exam and for the chiropractic adjustment. He moved around the ring and demonstrated for Randy his preference for the trot over the canter. When I asked Randy what he thought Cocoa should do for a living, he suggested driving. I think that puts all of us in agreement now that Cocoa needs to learn to pull and will be a very flashy and exciting horse in harness. Randy suggested that this would actually open up a market of buyers for him. I am so happy for Cocoa that I would like to throw a party. It has been a long haul for him and he has come through like a star.

Meg: her choppy gaits can be fixed. She needs dressage training to fix her posture. She also needs some chiropractic adjustments. It will not be easy to change the confirmation of her neck, but it is possible given time. When I told Van, he was very happy for her. We are still discussing exactly how to bring this about. One of the possibilities is that she joins him in Georgia and he takes lessons on her.

Ed: Randy recommended changing him to the Ultium feed that Dante and Cocoa are on. He said that conditioning is very important for his well-being in light of the HYPP. He is allowed to have sweet treats like carrots and apples. But he also recommended vigilance -- horses with even mild HYPP can die of it. Plans for Ed -- ride him. Feed him. Love him.

Dante: can't do tight circles or jumps. Will enjoy a light trail riding and possibly even second field foxhunting. I want to find somebody who can foxhunt with him in the second field. I think that he will absolutely LOVE it.

Rocket: has sore withers. Needs a bit of bute. Needs a better fitting saddle. Is sound and perfect for endurance.

Having Randy come out and evaluate these five horses was one of the best things I have ever done in our rehabilitation program. I think taking a sports medicine perspective on any horse entering our program is going to help us figure out exactly which direction to move the horse in.

Thanks, Randy.

Tally Ho Continued

2008-11-07T07:50:00.000-05:00

After much milling about the hunt was finally ready to move out. I was so nervous that I thought I would burst -- or maybe it was just excitement. I expected a sudden dashing off but actually people moved off rather slowly. I took my place in the line and tried to stay there and tried to stay very, very quiet. Francie was riding a very exciting dressage horse. In fact, many of the horses were excited and doing things to show how badly they wanted to go for a long and exhilarating gallop with the whole "herd." Heads tossed, hooves scraped the ground, legs worked up and down as the horses struggled to standstill despite the f

act that their bodies were bursting with the energy of a gallop. Rocket went forward and I could he feel his body become electric. But the most he did was to need to walk and trot in circles. What a good horse.

Our field master told us it was okay if we talked amongst ourselves as long as we weren't near the dogs. So I got to know some of the other riders. Heidi was there on a Morgan horse who was dancing with excitement and trying to get away with her. I don't remember the other people in the field. But we moved off at a walk and then at a slow trot. We saw the first field gallop away and soon they were out of sight. We trailed behind them.

Rocket struggled to be the first in the second field. That is the place of the field master so I had to hold him back. I didn't like hauling on his mouth the way I had to to keep him in check. But I could not let him go. The etiquette of the hunt dictates orderly conduct from horses and people.

The next half hour to an hour was all about walking, trotting, and cantering gently and watching the hunt from a distance. The mountains in the distance were blue. The hunt from a distance was spectacular. Flasks came out and mix a this or that were exchanged among riders who knew each other well. The mood became more hilarious.

After we got the hang of things, I asked to move to the first field and was granted permission. So when we had an opportunity (when the two fields came together at one point during the hunt), I cantered forward and joined the faster field. All this time I was smiling like my face would crack in half. I saw some new friends as I joined the first field. "I'm moving to the first field!" I called out. Everybody beamed.

But within minutes, the dogs were off, and the first field galloped after them. And I do mean gallop. We started trotting and trotting faster, and cantering, and then pretty soon we were all in a flat out run. We ran across a field, we turned sharply to the left and under some branches and continued on, and then another left, Rocket amazingly keeping up with Thoroughbreds and Morgan horses, and then yet another left and into the woods where we cantered and galloped down a hill and across a gully. When we came out of the woods a hold was called. We waited a few minutes while the dogs rediscovered the scent, and then off we went again at a gallop, this time through a serpentine trail and at one point the horses had to jump a stream. During this ride I fell more deeply in love with Rocket than ever, because he handled himself intelligently and even took care not to throw me off balance. I lost my stirrups once and started to fall forward on him and he brought himself slowly to a stop and then stood still and I could see his attention focused on making sure that I kept my seat. What a smart horse...

After jumping the stream we continued our gallop up the hill and we wound amid the clatter of hooves and mud down the hills, around the edges of tiny fields, and under trees and then emerged from a sharp ascent into a small field with a jump right in front of us. Horses streamed over the jump but I steered Rocket to the right because I have never jumped him and didn't want to start in that situation. After some resistance, he went the way I indicated he should go, and then when he caught sight of the jump out of the corner of his eye, he shied to the right and away from it. Note to self, I thought. Teach Rocket about jumps.

After the jump, a hold was called again and everybody laughed and compared notes about the previous part of the ride. Apparently, this is about as tough as it gets. I felt like I was glowing. Everybody else looked like they were glowing, too.

The hunt continued, following the dogs off along the fields and waiting for them to find the scent again.

And so it went. Walk, trot, Cantor, watch the dogs, watch the "whips" handle the dogs. Gaze at spectacular views, let Rocket grab some grass to keep up his energy. At the holds I stretched my legs and sat sideways on him. The English saddle works very well for this situation. I now understand why the hunt seat is the way it is. You use your feet and ankles and knees as shock absorbers almost like you are on a bicycle, not a horse. It's about flexibility, and balance, and "floating" above your horse. You need to lean forward so you can see the terrain ahead of you. Leaning back in this kind of situation is a mistake, because of the sudden changes. You really want to be over your horse's shoulders. I could say a lot about how much I learned about riding just using the hunt seat in the situation it was designed for.

We rode for many hours, until the sun was beginning to come down. At long last we (wearily) crossed the final fields and ended up back at the trailers and cars at Francie and David's house.

Then everybody tended to their horses. You could feel in the air the gratitude the people felt for their mounts. Each of us wanted to show our horses just how much we appreciated what they had just done for us. All the expensive gear came out: luxury blankets, soft brushes, pads for legs, combs for main and tail. I saw people massaging their horses. I wished I had a blanket for Rocket because it was becoming chilly and he had worked up a pretty good sweat. Another note to self.

It took a while to get Rocket to get on the horse trailer that was taking us home, because there was a horse on it who was a stranger to him. But he did it in the end and I gave him hay and tied him and and went down to the house for "breakfast." I got myself something to eat and something to drink and then started to strike up conversations with people I hadn't met yet. That was short-lived, though, because someone came and told me that Rocket had gotten out of the horse trailer (!).

I put on my gear again and jogged up the hill to where he was grazing quietly next to the trailer. Clearly, the other horse had done something to scare him and he had actually backed out of the trailer under the bar that was behind his rump. I didn't even know horses could do that. But it was then impossible to get him back on the trailer. Several people stopped to help me and one of them offered to drive us home in her trailer.

That trailer had two other horses in it but they were separated by a high wall. We tried to get Rocket to step up onto the trailer, but he had no intention of getting on another trailer with another set of strange horses. So I took them around to the side of the trailer where the horses were sticking their heads out. He got a chance to sniff them both and the one standing nearest to him was showing curiosity and friendliness. After that when we led him around to the back of the trailer again and tried to get him to step up, he resisted, but not with fear, simply with a preference not to do this. But we worked with him and let him think about it and urged him up and he finally got on.

The ride home was pleasant because my new friend Lee-Lee (I have no idea how to spell her name) was delightful company. We compared notes about our history with horses and about the hunt. Finally, Rocket and I were dropped at the end of our driveway and I led him down to the barn in the dark. The other horses caught wind of him and greeted him eagerly. He walked wearily into the barn and sighed with satisfaction at being home again. I fussed over him and gave him his grain and hay and felt strange to be leaving him to go into the house and take care of myself.

After such a weakened, Rocket and I have become closer than ever. We learned to rely on each other and to care for each other and to enjoy each other's company through 15 miles of trail riding and I don't even know how many miles of foxhunting. Since that weekend, whenever Rocket sees me, he murmurs a greeting in horse talk. I murmur back.

I'm sure I will be writing about foxhunt in the future. This is definitely something I want to do more of, and it is probably some of the best training Rocket could get to prepare for his long-distance competitions.

Our first race is going to be in January of 2009. Contact me if you'd like to help "crew" for the race.

Tally Ho

2008-11-04T02:13:00.000-05:00

Next morning I spent an hour or so getting everything together that I would need for the hunt. Also, I read a lot online about hunt rules. They're very precise. You MUST wear a stock tie knotted properly and heldin place with a horizontal pin. This is because the stock tie can double as a bandage in the event that anyone gets hurt. You must wear a black riding helmet, buff riding breeches, a black jacket, a white shirt, tall black boots, and no earrings.

Kate was explaining foxhunting to me and her barn employee Heidi the night before. She said one thing that really stood out in my mind: that foxhunting is not an equine sport; rather, it is a canine sport. Fox hunting is about the dogs. Hence, riders must fade into the background. One important way to do this is for everybody to conform to a dress code so that the dogs, and secondarily, the horses, become the features of the hunt.

Because it is a canine sport, the riders and their horses become spectators of what the dogs are doing. You ride in "fields," each governed autocratically by a "Field Master." The field master counts the members of her field and attends to their safety and enjoyment, something like a hostess. But you must absolutely do as your field master says, and you must tell her if you decide to leave the field. In fact, you must ask permission. She is tending to many things, not least of which is staying out of the way of the dogs so that none of them gets kicked. I think it must be hard to be a field master when you have new huntsmen in your field. For example, I saw the field master do a double take when she suddenly realized that two riders had disappeared. They had gone to check on a third rider who had fallen and left the field. The proper etiquette is to ask the field master if you can leave even for such a reason as that. It makes sense: if she doesn't know where the members of her field are she must go and find them. It is a heavy responsibility, being the field master.

The first field consists of riders and horses who can handle a more intense experience. They go faster, they go longer, and they go over jumps. Most of the jumps these days are "fixtures." They have been placed along the route specifically so that they can be used in hunts like this.

This club does not hunt real foxes. A woman was "laying the line" so as to make for a good hunt through absolutely gorgeous terrain. I'm not sure what she used. Something to do with anise.

We had a beautiful day: gloriously sunny and, because it is autumn, the sun was low on the horizon and the light was dramatic. The distant mountains looked blue.

English tack is required. I did not know whether Rocket could be ridden English. He is so comfortable going Western and neck reining that I never tried it. So, attired properly, I gathered together the English saddle, English bridle, and everything else except the stock tie. I called and left a message for someone to loan me one. I also found someone who would give me and Rocket a ride home in their trailer afterwards. Miraculously, the event was coming together for us.

Cordell gave me a ride down to New Haven. He helped me saddle Rocket. I was nervous. There were some other people at the farm who were going to the hunt. They were in a hurry. They had a trailer, and I didn't, so I wasn't sure if Rocket and I were going to make it in time. We had 2 miles to hack cross-country to get there. Nothingfor it but to try.

So off we trotted and cantered across the first field, in the English tack that I haven't used in many years for anything more than a few rounds in the ring. It took a couple of field lengths for me to get the hang of it. And then, I started to like it a lot. I'd forgotten how much easier just to use your ankles and knees as shock absorbers when you are riding English. I felt that I was a better partner for Rocket because I could vary my seat to match the terrain he was dealing with.

Rocket was eager to move after he got used to the idea that we were leaving a farm that had lots of horses. I was glad that we had extra time to warm up. I was especially glad not to be trying out new tack around a bunch of expert riders at a fox hunt. Half a mile across and fields, a short distance along the road, then back heading north On North St.

We cresteda gentle hill and there they were: the members of the hunt, beautiful from a half-mile away, and I could hear the dogs. Few things generate as much excitement in a horseback rider than the sound of dogs braying eagerly for the hunt-- and this is something I did not know until that very moment. We cantered gently across the field. Nice people processed us -- meaning gave us forms to sign and fixed a loose buckle on Rocket's tack. Somebody else gave me the stock tie I had called earlier about. Someone said, "you made it!" And there was Francie on her stunning dressage horse.

The horses were excited. Riders moved on their horses this way and that to give them an outlet for their energy.

I was assigned to the second field. They said that some horses become so excited that they do crazy things. They felt it best that we take an opportunity to look and understand before participating in the most intense part of the hunt. I thought this was quite sensible and gladly took my place with the second field.

Around this time I learned the great secret foxhunting: sherry. A person on the ground walked around among the riders offering us "smoke" something or other, a term that escapes me at the moment but that is related to the tradition of the stirrup cup. The stirrup cup actually hangs from the stirrup and you use it to accept a small amount of sherry at the hunt. Things are not so formal in this hunt club; we were offered plastic cups of sherry.

Almost everybody partook. Later, I learned that this is jokingly referred to as "a drink of courage." In fact, many riders had flasks attached to their saddles. During the hunt, people would drink from their flasks and then offer to their friends. And here I thought I might have begun to understand the need for all the rules. What a great sport -- you get a little tipsy, you do what you're told, and you have a beautiful adventure without having to call too terribly much on your own (perhaps alcohol impaired?) judgment. What a great system, thought I, as I accepted my own cup of courage.

More later. I couldn't sleep because I was thinking about this hunt among other things and decided to get up and write about it here. Note to new readers: I am using speech recognition software while my shoulder heals and it doesn't always understand what I say. If something doesn't make sense, just think about what it sounds like and you might be able to figure out the intended meaning.

At Any Rate, It's Traditional

2008-11-03T09:15:00.000-05:00

I headed out for a two-day trail ride, and ended up at a fox hunt!

To say that the ride was different from what I expected would be an understatement, from start to finish. Rocket and I left home with a camera, a cell phone, a water bottle, a sandwich, and an apple. I had my layers of clothing on, and my helmet; he had clean hooves and the most comfortable tack I could arrange for him.

We went out the back way across the creek to stop by at Magic's house. Nobody home, so we kept going up the field and across another fields and then across a very tiny field to talk to the landowner, a nice gentleman who was mowing part of the field. We chatted a bit -- he is a rider -- and I asked if he would let me cross his field. He said yes. (Note to self: the man needs some cookies.) So off we went to gently canter across that field and up the road for a bit then downhill to where there is a class IV road.

This is a road that is on the town books but that has not been maintained -- at least, not by the town. There is a footpath along from the property at the intersection of Roscoe Road and Rotax Road (the property that all of us horse lovers look at with envy because it has so many beautiful jumps) to another property that sits in the middle of many wide fields and at the border of some woods. We were following a tree line and later I realized that we were on the wrong side of that tree line. Too much bog. But Rocket was wise

Just as we came down out of these large fields we saw two riders on tall, elegant mounts. They stopped and we slowly walked forward to join them. They stopped well back from where we would intersect and after a few minutes of chatting, I found out why. They were a mother and daughter pair. The daughter, a teenager, and very sweet, was riding what she called "a special horse," an Irish thoroughbred. And then she said that she was paraplegic. I asked how long she had been paraplegic and she said for one year. Her goal, she went on to explain, is to participate in the Paralympics in 2012. I looked at her tack and that her mount, a gentle and quiet horse, tal but sturdy. She was using a Western saddle with a minimum of straps. Just a saddle, and a saddle blanket. Apparently she was balancing on her horse. We exchanged anecdotes about trails and they told me that I could cross their fields as long as I stated the edges. They said most people were pretty good about that. Then we went our separate ways, Rocket a little bit resistant to leave some company.

We rode out along a dirt road and ended up on a paved road. There we turned left, but we should have turned right. We were faced with an enormous bog with a single hill rising steeply out of it. Impassable. We followed the road until we got to a driveway going to the right. The driveway was close to the power line, so we followed it and then went up a hillside through very thick woods and came out the other side, where, it seemed in the middle of nowhere, someone said with surprise "Hello!"

It was a lovely woman named Marty who was fixing her fence. She has a few horses herself. She said she had heard that I was rescuing horses. We compared notes on our various riding experiences and she wondered how I had gotten there. I tried to explain to her the route that I took. She gave Rocket some water, which he refused. And on we went, this time along the side of (I think) Monkton Road for several miles. We tried to cut across country in a couple of places but it was not possible. In some places it was too boggy, in some places our way was blocked by fences. Eventually we just decided to stick with the road and travel south.

After a few canters along the roadside (Rocket was excellent at finding good footing right at the edge of the road) we were at a dirt road that took a more direct route south

We walked and trotted along this dirt road until we came to a farm where there were some trails that I could see from the road. Two people were playing with some horses in the back. We rode in their farm road and stopped to chat.

It was a man who walked over to talk to me and a woman who stayed back far away with the horses. The man told me that there were no trails that didn't go through their fields, and he didn't think that I would be able to get through. I thanked him and we went off along the dirt road. We went through some beautiful woods where somebody has been tossing trash out their car window as they went home and it looks like they had a pretty fixed habit. A lot of litter spoiled the look of the woods from the dirt road. Otherwise, that dirt road was one of the most idyllic parts of the ride. I got off and walked next to Rocket for a while. We came out of the woods and there was a horse farm on the right. A man was working at his wood pile. I walked over and asked if he would mind if Rocket got some water.

We went into the barn and found a bucket and a hose and I offered Rocket some water. Again, he refused it. The stalls in the barn were marked with the names of horses and their dams and sires. They looked like Morgan/paint crosses. I remembered that somebody had mentioned to me that there was a farmer around here who is breeding Morgan/paint crosses, but I'm not sure that that was the farm

Anyway, I mounted again and we went off down the road. We passed a water wheel on the left that Rocket found rather scary. Then we went up and open hillside and I remembered that at the next road I was going to turn left and try to find some trails off that road over to Route 17. So we went left but as I looked at the terrain I saw a deep gully that we could not pass. So we turned back and went down to North Street and continued south. At the top of the next hill was a pear tree. I stopped and let Rocket figure out that there were pears there (he was riding with a hackamore so he had no bit in his mouth and could munch). His demeanor was like a kid who had gotten a surprise birthday present. I let him months and looked around. The views were spectacular from there -- green mountains in the distance with open fields in front. Field after field.

We continued south and at one point found a nice grassy space between a horse fence and the road and we cantered along at. At the end was the house of the people who owned the horse farm. They shouted out a greeting and we walked over to say hello. Their names were Francie and David. We chatted for quite some time about our horses and about the neighborhood and they brought me a cup of cider. Rocket enjoyed their tasty grass while we talked. They mentioned that there was going to be a fox hunt at their house the next day.

The wheels started turning in my head. What if I went to the fox hunt instead of riding home again the next day? I wasn't sure I would be able to make it work. We would need full English tack, and I would need proper attire, and we would need a ride home again in a trailer.

So we went on and it was only about 2 1/2 miles more until we got to the Equestry and the end of our ride.

There Rocket found fresh green (second cut) hay and a warm stall out of the wind. By that time the sun was beginning to go down and it was bitterly cold once we stopped moving. I took off his tack and brushed him and fussed over him while chatting with Heidi, who works in Kate's barn. After a little while Kate came out and it was delightful to meet her. She is charming and interesting and I look forward to getting to know her better and learning from her. She is a dressage coach for Middlebury College. We talked about where dressage and endurance meet, and about her husband's work (he is a state representative) and about how crazy things can be in the world of Family Court. Apparently, he has heard many stories. We talk about all of our horses and she introduced me to the horses in her barn. They favor Canadienne Chevals. We talked about how difficult it is to balance your time when you are running a barn. It is easy to run out of time to ride. We talked about the possibility of collaborating to our mutual benefit. We talked about New Haven and the people who live there.

I called Cordell and it seemed he was there almost instantly to pick me up. He and Kate chatted a little and then I got into his (nice warm) truck. Warm at last.

So that was the ride down. I'll write about the fox hunt next time I get some time. Time to work at my day job.

Tomorrow's Planned Ride

2008-10-31T11:10:00.000-04:00

Pan a bit to the right. The blue lines indicate our route for a weekend-long ride. It's not exact, it's just meant as a guideline for anybody who wants to follow our progress. We will be staying in New Haven with our horses. We hope to be bringing the new gelding home when we return the next day. Actually, it may be just me and Rocket. I don't know if Rachelle is going to be able to go or not. Either way, with sunny autumn weather and excellent company, this promises to be a beautiful and refreshing ride.

Horses, an Update

2008-10-29T21:03:00.000-04:00

Dante: peaceful, confident, and bored. He's not being ridden enough.

Jack: happy, enjoying Memphis's company. But I've noticed in the last couple of days he has become a bit more independent. Still likes to come up and stand near me, waiting for his scratches. I love his tenor voice.

Memphis: followed me around the paddock today while I was trying to catch Rocket. She very nearly stuck her head right into the halter that I was carrying over my arm. That girl needs a job! She did very well pulling the cart the last time we had her in it. We really need to get her a good harness. But anyway, I think I'm going to have to ride her more, or at least bring her along when I'm riding other horses. I have never met a horse who baked as hard as she does to be worked. What a wonderful pony!

Cocoa: it's tricky to get on him. It can also be tricky after you're on him. He can't yet be mounted without somebody holding his head while his rider gets on. Even then, he needs a lot of warning and a lot of instruction so that he feels like he's being asked to do a specific thing (stand still) while something very predictable happens (somebody gets on his back). This is such an improvement over what he was like a year ago that I'm not complaining. As always, his emotions are the most important thing to control. He needs to be calmed and soothed before he is safe to mount. It also helps to free longe him long enough to let him get his oats worked off a bit. I like to ride him because he is so smooth.this picture is of him meeting the cow for the first time.

Ed: yesterday I looked at him and the first word into my head was NOT "ribs." He's gaining weight. Kordell put shoes on him to hold his hopes table while his abscesses work their way down. I want to write him but it was just too miserable out today. It certainly won't do him any harm to go a little longer without being ridden, but I would like to understand him better and having him under saddle is really the next step for that. He is so sweet.

Meg: she has not limped since right after the last time I rode her. Van is hoping that we can work with her to smooth out her gaits so that she can be a good endurance horse. He does not like the idea of selling her and finding another horse for endurance. He also doesn't like the idea of having two horses. We don't need t

o make that decision right away. Meg's attitude is very good

for endurance riding. She just loves to be out on the trail. But I'm not sure that she can physically handle it without hurting herself. As a matter of fact, I'm not sure that Van can handle it without hurting himself unless he spend

s more time in Vermont and is able to work out and ride every day. But anyway, I really get a kick out of make. Her attitude is a riot. The last time I met somebody like her I was sitting in my seventh grade class.

The cow: I really hate to notice that he's cute. He's supposed to be next year 's meat. I would never admit this to my children, but it does bother me to be friendly to animal that will end up going into the freezer. But he is so cute it's hard to resist.

In other news, Mikey wants a little gray kitten. A specific little gray kitten that belongs to his friend Colin. He is quite reasonable about asking for this kitten -- only mentions it a

bout once every 10 seconds or so.

Danny has been tired. His nose has been clogged up and I don't think he's sleeping through the night although he doesn't remember waking up. I see him start to wake up to breathe through his mouth and this is happening a lot each night. Being tired changes Danny's personality from open and loving to fragile and prone to meltdowns.

Cordell brought home a new Australian saddle yesterday. We tried it on Rocket this afternoon but it is too big for him. I think it will probably fit Cocoa. Cordell wants Cocoa to be his horse. Well, it may work out sometime to be that way. They would make a nice pair. It would be especially good for Cocoa because I think Cordell would work with him and tolerate his need to learn things slowly.

And Van, whom I miss constantly. The world in Atlanta reaches out and pulls him in like he's

drowning in some kind of soft pillow. Everything up here in Vermont starts to seem distant to him, although he hates the idea of missing anything. When he comes back, it will all fit perfectly again, but right now he feels very far away to me and I wish, wish he was here.

A Little Talk about Pain

2008-10-29T20:11:00.000-04:00

Now that I've had this pain for month after month I have begun to wonder what would happen if I didn't have it anymore. It's become almost a friend, a constant companion: at my side last at night before I drift off to sleep, and hovering, waiting for consciousness, to greet me first thing in the morning, almost like a lover. Everything else is anchored by it, revolves around it. If it wasn't there, I might lose my way. It shields me from things. The ache, the sharp stab, seize control of my attention and hold it suspended from any real engagement with the demands of life. It is jealous of other would-be lovers and holds me hostage in its grip, warning them off with threats of hurting me if they approach too closely or too fast. We are intimate, this pain and I, but I feel other intimacies slipping away.

Because of it, I have begun to hold my eyebrows closer together and down a little, almost like I'm working out a difficult puzzle. But really, I'm holding myself braced, and concentrating, always concentrating on how to do the next right thing without arousing my companion's ire.

The sharp stab in my shoulder is a fixed point, like the pin that holds the butterfly to the cardboard. I don't struggle against it because that just gives it strength. And I feel my life shrinking. Where I used to walk with pride I now walk with fear -- and this I resent, but only meekly. Never before have I had an attitude almost of supplication as a constant background to everything I do. I want to placate someone or something, but although it feels like a living personality, this capricious pain is merely a construct to help me understand and not something I can negotiate with.

I went to the doctor this morning. He is concerned that I don't have a greater range of motion and he is worried that my arm and shoulder might become permanently stiff. When I asked him if that meant permanently painful, he said, "Maybe."

Cordell's Great Aunt Gladys and Other Things

2008-10-23T23:29:00.000-04:00

Here she is:

Not much of a training day today. I'm tired and yesterday my arm got pretty sure. Today I took it easy and now my arm doesn't hurt.

Rode Meg yesterday. Found out why Van is having so much trouble sitting on her when she trots and canters -- she is a bit rough. Cordell said he might be able to help a little bit with the shoes. also I think she might be able to learn how to be smoother.otherwise she is a very good horse. Works hard to be a good girl. Is very strong. Also patient with her rider. Was limping by the end of the ride, and I think this is partly due to her choppy canter. I think it's hard on her shoulders. Hopefully we can work on this with her.

All I have energy for tonight... much more going on but too tired right.

Our Dearest Pri!

2008-10-21T10:32:00.000-04:00

This is a picture Priscila and me.I'll add some of the pictures that she took -- she has such an eye for the children.

She has a lot of wonderful pictures here.

Training Update

2008-10-20T23:21:00.000-04:00

I wanted to write down the training progress. So here's the list:

-- Rocket did the 5 mile loop this morning at a good clip. He arrived home sweaty and a little bit out of breath but in general feeling pretty good.
-- Meg also did the 5 mile loop this afternoon not quite so fast as Rocket. She gave Rachelle a hard time on the way up the driveway but after that, Rachel said, she was sensible for the rest of the ride.
-- cocoa did some ring work. He learned how to back up and how to do a side pass! He is careful with his feet and it makes it easy to teach him new motions. He started to learn how to respond to leg pressure and was doing quite well with it in the ring -- not quite so well when we took a brief trail ride. On the ride outside the ring he found it difficult to focus on his rider and instead was looking at everything else in the world.
-- Memphis pulled the cart around the ring and then out and part way up the driveway. After that we had some safety issues because the harness doesn't really fit her and a piece is not attached the way I think it should be to the cart. Looks like maybe some hooks are missing from the cart. Memphis loved being the center of attention and stood quietly to be harnessed, then did her best while she was pulling the cart.

In other news, Rachel found Mimoka up in the tree near the ring meowing pitifully. I called Danny. Getting cats down from trees is something that Danny has proven quite good at and this was no exception. But it posed some interesting problems because the lowest branches were way above even my head.

First Danny tried to walk up a board propped against the tree (we don't have any ladders tall enough) but the board was too wobbly so he wisely got back down. And then he climbed back up the tree next to the tree that Mimoka was in. Mimoka seem to enjoy the company up there in the Heights with her. But neither could Danny reach her nor she reach him, so after a while Danny got back down. At that point I had to go into the house and start dinner. A few minutes after I got in there, however, Danny came running in and up the stairs. I didn't have to ask him what he was after. It was obviously the orange monkey.

Armed with Mimoka's favorite toy Danny went back outside and begin dangling around at the bottom of Mimoka's. tree. Again I had to go back to focusing on dinner. A few minutes later I heard the front door open and Danny come in. I was afraid to look, because I was worried that Danny would be sad about Mimoka being stuck up in that tree as it got darker and darker outside. So from my position at the sink I asked, "Did you get her down?"

"Yes!" he said with well-deserved pride. And there was Mimoka perched in Danny's arms purring like a motor boat.

And just in case you're curious about the monkey, perhaps this video will help.

2008-10-19T23:05:00.000-04:00

I can't figure out how to make the whole picture fit in the space that the blog takes up. If you want to see the pictures without having the right side cut off, click on one of them and you will be taken to the photo bucket website. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Dedicated to Clementine and Priscila

2008-10-19T21:23:00.000-04:00

Van was here with his wonderful camera so we have lots of pictures from this past weekend. I wanted to share them with people I love. I wish you were all here more often.

And Some More Pictures

2008-10-15T23:49:00.000-04:00

Danny and me.
Van and Me
Clementine and Nina At the Beginning of a Training Session with Cocoa

Some Pictures You Haven't Seen

2008-10-15T17:22:00.000-04:00

src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_DfmTNKu88F0/SPZjz1JOwWI/AAAAAAAACQQ/bPHAcVW8EiQ/s400/GEDC0667.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5257499357091905890" />

Magical Moments

2008-10-15T12:43:00.000-04:00

I love to watch new horses meet my sons. Mikey is nine years old, and Danny is 11 years old. it's hard to describe just why the moment when one of our new horses spots one of the boys and approaches him stands out as so magical in my mind. But it's something about the -- I won't say purity, and I won't say nakedness, though both words came to mind -- maybe what I mean is familiarity. The spirit and energy of a child is much more like the spirit and energy of a horse than that of an adult is. When a horse and a child interact, they follow no script. The horses ears come forward the child shrinks a little with nervousness, then reaches out just as the horse stretches forward his nose, ear forward, eyes wide. A sniff, a touch, and then, after a brief period of mutual curiosity, it always seems that both lose interest at almost exactly the same time. They recognize each other on some level and understanding is swift and unselfconscious.

Give that girl a job!

2008-10-14T14:22:00.000-04:00

Yesterday after a long, fast trail ride on Rocket, I was leading him around the ring to cool him down. Memphis and Fleetfoot Jack were also in the ring waiting for their turns. Memphis was quite interested in the fact that Rocket was being led around the ring. In fact, she started to insinuate herself into the process. Within about five minutes, as a matter of fact, she had completely ousted him from his place on my right side. She was walking at the same pace as I was, and stopping when I stopped, and otherwise paying very careful attention to what I was doing.

"Me," she seemed to be saying. "Me."

I love this!

2008-10-12T18:42:00.000-04:00

It's Nina! My favorite part is the ending.

For those of you who don't know, Nina spent some time at the farm with her family this past summer and did a lot of work. She played a big part in many of our horses' lives.

Plans for the Day

2008-10-11T07:43:00.000-04:00

I talked to a nice woman last night who's interested in cocoa. She's coming this morning to see him. She sounds like a rider with a lot of experience -- some of it saddle seat, so she is used to Morgans. I plan to work him as usual, in the ring first, and then, if her riding experience seems to support a larger adventure, out of the ring on a very short "trail ride."

Quick Check-In

2008-10-09T17:06:00.000-04:00

I have little time to write and much to talk about. The big news is that Cocoa has been ridden several times now by Cordell.

This came about because I went down to Woodstock with some friends to attend a Green Mountain horse Association members-only trail ride (The picture above is from the trail ride. It's of Rachelle and her mom). The night before the ride we had dinner with some very nice people who seemed to have a lot of experience training Morgans. Cocoa is half Morgan and half Saddlebred, so I thought they might have something of value to offer. Well, they did. Not only the woman across from me, but the man next to her and the woman next to him all agreed that Cocoa needed was... treats.

Armed with this excellent advice, Rachelle and I brought Cocoa into the ring on Monday. We free-longed him as usual with a saddle on, and when he was calm and cooperative Rachelle started getting up and down off of his right side. He is extremely skittish about his left side. Cordell watched, but I know he's got half an eye on Cocoa for himself, so I invited him to participate. He came into the ring and immediately approached cocoa on his left side. But he is Cocoa's farrier -- Cocoa is used to having him ask for things that seem scary and that turned out all right. He accepted the approach. I kept feeding him treats. After a few minutes I realized that, without anybody really noticing, Cordell had hung off of Cocoa 's left side like a berry on a branch. Coco was bearing his full weight. Then Cordell stood on the ground again and put his foot in the stirrup. Then he lifted himself up a bit, then stood up in the stirrup. I raised an eyebrow at him. "You know, he's not wearing a bridle. If he decides to buck and puts his head down, Rachelle and I will not be able to stop him." Cordell said nothing, but within two minutes there he was, sitting calmly on Cocoa 's back while Cocoa calmly ate more treats. It was done.

I watched Cocoa and Cordell walk around the ring together for a little bit after that. Tears came to my eyes. When Cocoa first came to us he tried to kill people by striking out with his front feet, stallion style. He was crazy from being confined in a dark barn for his entire life, then suddenly finding himself out in place of strange sights, sounds, smells, where his body was moving in new ways (in straight lines rather than round and round endlessly in a small stall). It was too much for him, but he desperately needed to be free. For the first year I have worked on teaching him that freedom comes with cooperation. He finally figured it out. His manner with Cordell was gentle and curious and loving. And so very graceful.

So yesterday, we continued where we had ended on Monday. This time, Cordell tried to get on the left side and had no success. He did better on the right side -- got right up and over and onto Cocoa. I helped Cocoa figure out how to take one step, and then two steps, and then outright walk around the ring. At each step, Cocoa needed to find his balance all over again from the last step.

A whole new world has opened up for this horse.

In other news, Meg has a cut on her butt. It is very deep. We might not be able to write her for a little while, but she doesn't seem to be in any pain. We've cleaned and bandaged it and taped it shut. We have begun going over the paddock carefully to find out how she got it. She and cocoa were fighting so it may just have been a nasty bite from him. He always leaves marks on the other horses. We have him with Ed now, and he is not as aggressive with Ed because Ed never questions his authority.

Real Cool Ice Te, a.k.a. Timone, a.k.a. Mo, a.k.a...

2008-10-07T01:50:00.000-04:00

Ed.

Yes, the poor guy gets yet another name. But every time I think about him, or talk about him, or talk to him, the name Ed pops out of my mouth. Sometimes I think of him as Ed.

I'm a bit concerned about his respiration. I don't usually become aware of when and how a horse's briefing, but around him I am noticing when he draws a breath. It looks like he's kind of holding his breath. So at some point in the not-too-distant future, especially if he doesn't gain weight, he will need a visit from the veterinarian.

Rachelle, her mom, Magic, and I all went down to Woodstock on Saturday to go on an all-day ride Sunday. I took Rocket, Magic took Meg, Rachel took Poet, and her mom, Kris, took Joey. The foliage was beautiful. It was great to ride with a larger group, and on trails that we had never seen before.

Introducing Mo

2008-10-03T23:22:00.000-04:00

Afraid to Feed the Horses

2008-10-02T23:22:00.000-04:00

all the horses are in the meadow right now. That's a herd of 6 -- and are they ever happy to be there together.

The problem is feeding time. Trying to feed a herd is tricky at best, but in my condition it is dangerous.Cordell feeds them in the morning and he has a system worked out that seems to work pretty well for him. But I've tried now for two nights in a row to feed them, even with help, and it is too scary.They mill around and fight with each other. Although none of them would deliberately hurt me, I can easily picture a situation where one of them suddenly moves sideways or backwards and bumps me. Even a bump like that hurts and could do harm. And another phenomenon with feeding the herd is that as they fight with each other and sometimes a stray hoof or set of teeth aimed at somebody else lands on the handler (me). I'm not ready yet to take on this challenge. If I had two good arms I could get a horse with a lead rope and put him in a separate area and go back and get another horse and put him in the same area so that I could feed the two slowest eaters in that smaller area. But I'm not able to lead a horse and open and shut a gate all at the same time. That's a two-handed operation. No matter how I look at it, it's just not a good idea for me to be taking care feedings like this.

I can think of only one solution -- and that is to keep the horses that need grain here at the farm. I'm sorry to do that to them because it is good for them and they are happy out there in the big meadow. But I guess safety first. How about that -- you won't hear me saying that very often. I am humbled by how difficult this recovery is turning out to be. I never want to go through this again.

New Horse Coming on Friday

2008-10-01T08:20:00.000-04:00

Today all the horses are over at Mel's Meadow. Cocoa is home again from Magic and Alan's place. So Mel is getting to look out her window and see six horses. It will soon be 7 -- yesterday morning Elizabeth, Cordell, and I went to see a horse named Mo (registered name Real Cool Ice Te) who was advertised as being free. According to the ad, he was not sound. He's also severely underweight. But when we got there, the owner said that he had an abscess on his foot. So as it turns out, what she's giving away is a well bred quarter horse who's underweight but perfectly sound once his abscess heels. And he's well trained. He's just the kind of horse that I like to put into my program. He doesn't need training so much as he needs recuperation and then he'll be ready to become somebody's special horse. I'll post pictures once he gets here. Once he arrives, he will go through a series of treatments for his foot -- mostly Epsom salts soaks twice a day and careful attention to the ground he's standing on, because his feet cannot get wet. He'll probably need to go back and forth from the stall to the ring. After two weeks of careful treatment he will be turned out with the herd and fed like Dante is (that is, a lot) so that he can gain weight. His previous owner neglected to feed him and he's about 400 pounds underweight. He has some dietary restrictions because he has a congenital problem that affects many quarter horses which causes him not to be able to cannot process potassium. So he can eat only oats and hay and grass, but no treats. I think I'll have to put a sign up at the Meadow so that people don't feed the horses. Cordell says that he sees evidence of people giving them treats. A lot of people walk by that Meadow and enjoy spoiling the horses, but unfortunately, spoiling Mo would be harming him. Oh -- and very importantly, he needs a new name. We can't change his show name but we can change his barn name. He is a chestnut with a gentle, kind disposition. He usually ends up at the bottom of the hierarchy in a herd. But get to know him a little bit better and then start brainstorming names for him.

Talking about Meg

2008-09-29T20:47:00.000-04:00

Meg is a silly horse. I know, I said that about Amigo. But he was funny in a different way. I still miss him, by the way. But I know he's where he belongs right now so I'm trying not to let it get to me. And besides, now there is Meg!

(A note to the reader: I'm still using speech recognition software. Every now and then it puts funny things in place of the words actually said. For example, up above what I said "and besides, now there is Meg!" The speech recognition software first put, "And besides, now there is an egg!" I usually catch all of these, but it bears repeating that if you see something absolutely absurd ("observed") in what I'm saying, think about what it sort of sounds like, and you might be able to figure out what I meant.)

You can see Meg's ("mixed") picture in the post Sad.

As so often, I'm out of time. It happens so often that I began with just one or two paragraphs and run out of time so this time I'm going to leave it rather than deleting it and thinking that I'll start over again tomorrow. I'll just continue tomorrow.

So as my father says, look for
More Later.

Riding

2008-09-25T09:38:00.000-04:00

I got this wonderful in e-mail this morning from a friend who is going through something worse than I am. Her e-mail asking for help and support for herself and her children was full of humor. I know she's very upset about what's happening in her life, but she chose to make a joke out of it in this graceful way. You know how you go through life, and you see what other people do, and sometimes you notice something and you think "I could learn from her." I often have this experience with that person. I admire her very much. She's making soup these days and putting it into her freezer. On Monday, her daughter stopped by with some soup for us!

I feel like a small explosion has gone off in my face -- that everything has been rearranged by a startling force. I want to be graceful and admirable like my friend. But one of the hardest things about this new landscape is that I don't it always admire what I do in response. I've been very emotional, for instance. Yesterday was one of those days when I had a conversation with somebody and I wish I could rewind the clock and or wave a magic wand and have it never have happened.

I guess we all have challenges. I know we all have challenges. The developments of the last few years have often left me feeling helpless. When you go through a divorce and the courts become involved, you lose something that is very precious and that most parents take for granted -- the right to make decisions for your children. One of my children is facing a change that I don't think make sense for him. But that decision is out of my hands. Yesterday, when I was speaking to the person who has the right to make this decision, I was not the calm, cool, collected mother that I always wish I was. I was upset, and it showed. This is unwise -- and probably unpleasant for the person I'm speaking to. I didn't attack her personally, because I like her, but I could have made her job easier by accepting what I can't change.

One of the ways that I keep my perspective in the midst of all the chaos of postdivorce court proceedings, and having the financial underpinnings pulled out from under me, and trying to find wise and responsible ways to recover, is to ride.

I'm sure many of you riders feel this way: that when you ride, all the troubles of the world drop away and you are living and breathing moment to moment in partnership with a creature of amazing elegance -- and I mean elegance in both the physical and spiritual realms. Being with the horse is like being enfolded in a greater spirit, one that helps you find your way to peace. The best riders think like their horses.

I have missed riding more than I can say. Going through all of this without recourse to my most important emotional underpinning is like trying to take a written test with a blindfold on.
So yesterday, I finally gave in.

Rachelle helped me saddle Rocket, and bridle him. She tacked up Meg. I stepped onto a tall bucket and Rocket stood stock still as I leaned on one stir up and then slowly brought my other leg over his back and sat down. He never moved a muscle. Then I took the reins in my left hand and sighed. Home.

After Rachelle mounted, we rode up the driveway, turned right, and walked along the dirt roads to the covered bridge. Rocket went right over the covered bridge for me without any fuss. Meg was a bit afraid of it, but Rachelle is a very confident and experienced rider and she helped Meg get through this initial encounter.

It was a short ride. But we did cross Louis Creek. The water was up to the horses' chests.
I wore my sling. It protects my arm from swinging outward -- the only movement that could actually hurt me badly.

I know, I know, I'm pushing it. From a birds eye view the idea of somebody riding a horse two and half weeks after shoulder surgery seems absurd. But from where I'm sitting, it doesn't. I know this horse. He and I understand each other. It may not look safe, but I feel safe on the back of a horse.

Sad

2008-09-21T21:29:00.000-04:00

Here is this beautiful new horse and I can't ride her.

Meg

2008-09-16T13:30:00.000-04:00

I learned so much about Meg this morning. I had a short training session with her to see if we could figure out a way that I could lead her around without getting bumped . I led her on my left side and walked very slowly and made it clear that she needed to stay behind my left shoulder. She learned fast, and she was careful. she really likes the attention -- just have something to do, to be told to do this walk this way , stop, start again. She enjoyed herself. Then I took off the lead rope and practiced putting her halter on and off with one arm. She was helpful -- she put her nose right into the halter and waited patiently while I took it off and then put her nose back into it again when I wanted to put it back on again. Then I sat in the ring with her. Van was mending fences when a funny thing happened: Meg developed a crush on Van. He had a drill and a saw and he was working all up and down the side of the ring. She followed him like a little puppy. When he stood still and worked for a while in the same spot she closed her eyes and stood near him with this cute little smirk on her face. When he left the ring she even got a little bit upset. I sat on my beach chair in the middle and watched all of this. When Van came back she started following him around again. Van said that if things go along as they have been, he'll have a girlfriend in every species on the farm.

I free-lunged Meg a little bit. She joins up so well! In about five minutes she was following me around matching me step for step , stopping when I stopped , matching my pace, paying careful attention to where my feet were and where her feet were.

This afternoon, we will saddle and bridle her, Rachelle will ride her, and then I think Van will take a turn in the ring riding her. It is possible that Meg and Van will make a better pair than Rocket and Van. Rocket is afraid of men it seems -- he gets upset and scared when he has a man on his back. I suspect that the spur scars on his sides were not put there by a woman.

No matter how it works out -- which one of us rides which horse, clearly the foursome of me and Van and Rocket and Meg shows a lot of promise. We are absolutely delighted with her. She's funny, curious, and confident. She pays attention. She loves to have people paying attention to her even when what they're asking her to do is work. Van commented that if she was going to follow him around while he worked on fences he should give her her own tool belt.

I miss Amigo. I miss his beautiful face, and his expressive eyes. I miss his funny and complex and silly ways. but I think this arrangement is excellent for the people and for the horses. Amigo has a new friend, Ed, who is an extremely laid-back Belgian. Amigo will learn from Ed's attitude that anxieties are pointless. the people Amigo lives with want to keep Amigo and Ed together, both in the paddock and on rides. I am eager to hear how things go for him.

Shoulder Surgery and Its Aftermath

2008-09-14T14:01:00.000-04:00

the shoulder surgery was on Monday. I was home before the children were home from school. General anesthesia was not as bad this time as it has been in the past. I had no nausea. My arm was completely numb, so I had no pain until the next day.

I would like to be able to describe the experience just as it was. I don't know why it's so hard to do that. I can talk about the nighttime sounds, and about things like pain medication, but these things seem unreal. But when I start to talk about what my children's smiles have meant to me, what Van's constant care has meant to me, what it has been like to eat food prepared by people who don't even know me, I get all tangled up inside and I simply can't explain.

mom was there when I woke up and I know this was hard for her because she had just had foot surgery couple of days previous to this. But there she was -- a focus of familiarity in the echoing halls of hospital I had seen only once before. Coming out of general anesthesia, anything familiar is a life jacket.

Van drove me home, I think perhaps terrified that some car would hit us, just because it was the day of surgery.I carried in my lap an alien thing, my arm. It had weight and texture like a rubber chicken, but in no sense that it feel like my arm. it had been completely numbed for the surgery.

When the children came home I heard Van intercept them at the door and speak to them seriously before he would let them come and see me. He was really very afraid that I would break. I was touched, and touched more by the faces of my children when one by one, and rather shy, they came into the room to see how I was doing.Mikey wanted to curl up next to me, but he was afraid to. Instead, he went to the other bed. I asked him if he wanted to come and be on the same bed as I was on. He replied, "I'm used to snuggling up to you when were both on the bed. Since I can't snuggle up to you, I don't even want to get on the bed." So I pointed to a place next to my left side, away from my arm, and said here, there's room for you right here. You should have seen him smile, and you should have seen the alacrity with which he crossed the room and curled up like a little butterfly next to me.Danny had brought a book with him. He was ready to keep me company. He asked me if I needed anything. He seemed pleased that I looked basically the same as I had when he last said goodbye to me.

That first day I spent a lot of time being awake and alert. I had no pain, and I had already slept for half the day during the surgery. This surprised me though this wakefulness. During the night I went out and saw horses. They snuffled around my arm. Van ran defense -- and that was necessary, because some of them wanted to nudge me.

Running out of energy. The week has been a very sleepy, relaxing time. I have had much good food thanks to my wonderful neighbors and friends. At this point, I'm optimistic. I think recovery will go faster and better than I've been told. It's only been one week, but right now I feel like this is all something that I can handle: I can get better, I can rehabilitate my arm, I can ride horses sooner rather than later.

I have to remind myself not to be upset if, later, I feel more discouraged. It's only been one week, and I have had so much help, I don't think the worst has happened yet. The doctor said that maybe about two months later, I mean, two months after the surgery, people often wonder why they ever did it. But at the end of the year, he said, I may realize why.

Talking about Rocket

2008-09-14T13:23:00.000-04:00

I have much to talk about rocket in this blog ever since we got him. He is an amazing horse. We got them from a farmer in the southern part of Vermont, who had gotten him in turn from a young woman who rode him a lot and said he only reared once. And that was when a big truck went by and used its brakes.

From what the farmer has told me, I gather that rocket was a wild stallion. He was captured, branded, and trained to herd cows. Then he was sold, apparently to the woman who rode him a lot.

He sounded like the ideal horse for Van. And unlike so many things that are different from what they sound, rocket has become a farm favorite, and it looks like he will be Van's companion on many trail rides to come.

Rocket is responsive. He is quick, he loves to run, he tries very hard to do what he's told, he is in good condition, he is sound, and he is very happy to be living with us. It also seems that he was abused at some point. I don't like to say this about horses; I think new owners are very much inclined to say that previous owners somehow were not good for their horses. But I think sometimes the fault lies in the new relationship, not the old one. I have seen a horse kick at his farrier while the owner stood by and talked about how that horse must have been beaten around the legs; to the farrier and to me, it looked as if that horse had simply not been told that it was a requirement that you not kick your farrier.

Rocket has a brand on his left hip. From the look of the brand, he was not sitting still when they did it. He also has gouges in his sides --both sides -- somewhere behind the girth. He react violently to any sort of equipment; but the farrier and I both think that the farrier's tools remind him of branding. He doesn't respond to the tools with irritation or annoyance or even anger. He responds with pure terror.

I have ridden Rocket through thick forests, across creeks, over stone walls, through swamps, along dirt roads and paved roads, in darkness and in the daylight, and not once has he ever faltered or failed to do as he was asked. At times I rely on his judgment. At times, he relies on mine. No horse has ever and as much of a partner as Rocket is. I have used him to herd other horses -- an extremely challenging job for any horse, especially one low down on the totem pole -- and he always gives his best. The merest hint or change in body language changes Rocket's response.

I do not understand how such a horse could have been abused as it seems he was. I am happy for him that now he has Van. Van can teach him how to trust; rocket will teach Van much about riding. Currently, Rocket runs away when he can.he is terrified when he is caught. I think this may be a clue. I get the impression that whoever trained him was angry when he ran away and punished him when he caught him again. I think he or she may have done something with the left hand. When Rocket has been running away and I catch him, he shies away from my left hand. His reaction is so sudden and so violent to even the slightest movement of the fingers on my left hand, that I believe this was a trigger point somehow.

as for the other abuse, I think the brand says a lot. Even that one experience, coming soon after being captured from the wild, would be enough to make an intelligent horse afraid of any similar paraphernalia. The gouges on his sides appear to be from spurs. rocket is extremely sensitive to any like pressure at all. I think it's obvious why.

Nonetheless, rocket is now wearing for shoes, which were put on his feet without the aid of tranquilizers. It took a patient farrier (and I highly recommend mine) space about an hour to put them on. Did I mention that Rocket is intelligent?

(By the way, I'm using voice recognition software to type this blog entry. It has its problems as you may have noticed that it is better than trying to type left-handed only.)

Nighttime

2008-09-14T04:39:00.000-04:00

When I woke up a little while ago, I could hear the comforting nighttime noises. Throughout the last week when I've had nothing better to do I've lain in bed listening to the nighttime noises. Crickets, insects, horses snorting, owls hooting.this time I had woken up because I felt appalled by pressure and pain in my shoulder. I had forgotten that this was normal. then I shifted, listened, and was comforted by the other normal things I could hear. When I turned on the light, I heard a horse breathe out in a half snort. Somebody else was awake and had seen the light go on.

Could you please... just... stop TALKING.

2008-09-03T19:11:00.000-04:00

That was the thought that went through my head today listening to the physical therapist. After the surgeon. In fact, the anesthesiologist's discussion was the bright moment of the day, despite graphic descriptions of nausea to come.

More later... company has arrived.

Bella Yesterday

2008-08-31T13:23:00.000-04:00

Not quite a full milk bag. She's tired, but reasonably happy. Not waxed over yet. Baby has dropped. Come on, Bella, we all want you to be on the other side of this!

TDM Hot to Trot in Vegas!

2008-08-28T17:48:00.000-04:00

Look at him go. Just one year old and he was jumping over 3 feet.

Amigo on a Night Time Trail Ride

2008-08-27T00:21:00.000-04:00

Amigo is a bit of a silly horse, we've all come to agree here at Chiron's Grove. When he goes on a trail ride, we gather a list of the things that make him stop to consider his situation before moving forward. Now, that would be simple, except that when Amigo decides to move forward, few horses are as brave as he is about doing what he's asked to do.

This was never more evident than tonight.

We have a new resident here at the Grove, and that is our farrier, Cordell of Smart Shoeing (his last name is actually "Smart," lucky guy). Cordell moved in yesterday to the apartment in the basement. He will be handling the morning feedings and helping in lots of general ways (including shoeing, yay for that). Cordell is really good at controlling horses, obviously, because he has to stand underneath them all the time and work on their feet. And Cordell also used to ride in a scrappy sort of way as a kid. Same as me, come to think of it. You know, the kind of riding where your pony might just jump the log you asked him to, or he might stop, look at you, and then roll. Or jump in the pond. You just learned to deal with these things as a farm kid.

Anyway, Cordell hasn't had much time to ride in quite a while, what with being in the military, getting married, having three children, and running a farrier business. But he wanted to get back into it.

We've been without a car here for the summer, and as a result, I've learned what it's like to use horses for transportation. Especially since Rocket got here, I've loved my trips to places like the Spear St. Store and Magic's house to check on Bella. Checking on Bella has become a nightly thing. I go and get Rocket, then head off over to Magic's house to see how she's doing (when is that foal coming, anyway?). Although I try to get this done early enough to have daylight the whole way, as the days get shorter, more and more of my ride is in darkness.

So tonight, Cordell was here and he wanted to come along. So along with Rocket we saddled up Amigo. Amigo the cautious. Amigo the homebody.

We left when the stars were out, and by the time we got home the stars were like a carpet on the sky. In between, Amigo faced numerous challenges.

First, just going up the driveway at that time of day (8 pm) was a challenge. He'd rather not go. He liked it just fine in the barn. Okay, the corral. Okay, maybe just the driveway. But not the road, definitely not the r-- all right, all right, if you're going to slap my butt with that stupid baling twine... and so Cordell got him along, one way or another, until we got to the covered bridge.

I've been doing this ride with Rocket quite a bit. I expected him to cross the bridge nicely for me. But it was completely dark by the time we got there, no moon, nothing but starlight, and Rocket saw that bridge as being full of hiding places for cougars (remember, he was a wild stallion for years before he was trained). No way, no how was he going over that bridge. I capitulated and got off him. Usually that's enough. I have this trick that I do with horses who don't want to go somewhere. I stand just behind the left ear, stroke and maybe scratch the neck a little, and whisper, "Hey, let's do it together. We're partners." For a lot of horses, and usually with Rocket, this works. Most horses just want to feel like they're not alone. But even that wonderful trick completely failed to move him into the teeming shadow of the covered bridge.

Clip clop. Suddenly Amigo was passing us, walking in his high-stepping way onto the bridge. Rocket relaxed and followed him. It seems that Cordell and Amigo had had a conversation and Amigo had decided to trust Cordell cross the bridge for him. See? that's what I like about Amigo. He'll balk and balk, but once he decides to do what you ask, nobody is braver.

So off we went after the bridge up to Magic's house to see how Bella is doing. We did a little jogging. Well, Rocket jogged (he's just getting the hang of the Western jog), and Amigo did this sort of walk-really-fast, trot-a-little thing to keep up with us. Not exactly comfortable for Cordell on a bareback saddle.

This part of our ride was with Lewis Creek on our right and a large meadow on our left. I looked up, and saw the Milky Way like a path in front of us. I didn't want to stop looking at those stars.

When we got past the open area, Amigo had a problem going under the trees and into the shadows again. Rocket was the guy in good form this time. He relaxed and stood very still while we waited for Amigo and Cordell. I was proud of him. Rocket likes to move, and for him, the training challenge has been to teach him to relax and not to burn energy unless it's needed. So when he chills out and cocks a rear foot while I sit on him on a dark road, I feel pretty darn proud.

Cordell and Amigo talked, and Amigo considered, and Cordell encouraged him, and Amigo balked, so finally Rocket and I walked back to them. I gave Cordell an apple I had in my pocket. Maybe he just needed a little endorphin kick to relax and head into those shadows.

Nope.

So Rocket and I swung around behind him and pushed him from behind (not pushed as in pressed against him; pushed in the horse sense of putting pressure on him just by moving towards one of his pressure points--in this case, his hip). I flopped my reins in a very loose and silly way across his rump. He finally moved out, and kept moving out as we went up the final hill to Magic's house.

So we went there, and we laid hands on Bella to see how she was (skinny, for a pregnant mare, and extremely tired). Cordell let the horses graze and then handed them over to me and messed a bit with Rosie's feet (Rosie is a two-year-old black Percheron filly, so her feet are a bit hard to lift). I stood with the horses and looked up again at the stars. What a night for stars!

Then we started home again. Amigo needed a bit of herding to get started, and he stopped once on the way home because he saw the horses we had just left as they walked in front of the back porch light. At one point both horses shied and gave a wide berth to a point in a field where we couldn't see anyting. Could have been a fox, or a bobcat, or a fisher... only the horses knew.

As we went home, I couldn't just look ahead. Most of the time I had my neck craned so I could watch those fascinating stars. Saw a shooting one, once. Identified the north star, and the big dipper, and Cassiopeia, and the little dipper; but the Milky Way was the path that led directly from Magic & Alan's house to my house. If we had been gods, we would have walked the Milky Way carpet on our immortal steeds to go from one house to the other. As it was, we only felt like gods, and our steeds were only normal horses--but even as such, they felt like the creatures that could lead us to eternal and spiritual places. Even Amigo, for whom the whole trip out and back was a long challenge to his nerves.

But he did it. We came home around 10 pm, safe and sound (I wonder if Amigo remembers those safe arrivals home when he goes out on another scary adventure? I doubt it.).

Off with the saddles; scratches for both horses where the saddles maybe itched them; into the paddock with their friend Vegas, a few flakes of hay, and lots of fresh, cold water.

During those hourse, riding in the darkness, Cordell and I spoke of nothing but the things that were happening right then and there, and that only when words were needed because nothing else would do. The best rides are like that. On the best rides, riders enter communion with our horses that easily replaces nattering words that puncture the largeness and emptiness of spirit to which our horses unconsciously lead us. It was clip clop, and a craned neck looking at the stars, and one shooting star, and the steaming of our breath and our horses' flanks.

Few things are as good as a night-time ride. And Amigo, despite his fears and his nervousness, managed to carry his rider through the whole experience. He probably doesn't know to be proud of himself, but I know to be proud of him.

Good boy, Amigo. And Rocket, what an excellent job you did helping your friend along.

Mikey's Birthday

2008-08-26T11:34:00.000-04:00

This was us the morning of August 23rd. I'm not sure how to clean up the audio, though I'd like to.

What a wonderful birthday breakfast! Both of us enjoyed every minute of it. Afterwards, we went to Barnes & Noble and got some books for both boys.

Our Delightful Friends

2008-08-20T09:05:00.000-04:00

Look at these delightful girls! They are Clementine and Nina. They stayed with us for a month. This post is dedicated to them.

Dear Nina and Clem,

Everybody here misses you. Especially Memphis, who is tossing her head more than ever, but looks so nicely muscled since all the attention she got while you were here.

Dante was sick three nights ago--very sick. He was lying down and getting back up again, pawing the ground, and looking at his stomach. As you know he has been through this before, so I walked him a little and let him get to the hay. He was passing manure, so I thought maybe this was his usual bout of ulcer pain.

But the next morning I woke up very early because of some loud banging in the barn. I went to see, and found Dante down in a stall, clearly having been there most of the night, and in a lot of pain. The banging was from him kicking the sides of the stall. He hadn't drunk any water, either, which is very strange for him. I couldn't get him up, so I called the vet and then started brushing him as he lay on the ground. He closed his eyes and relaxed. After a while, he tried to get up, and this time succeeded. We started walking up and down the driveway until the vet arrived.

Treatment was for pain, and then eight bags (boluses) of fluids that we gave him intravenously. The vet left some more bags to give him and instructions for his continuing care.

But Dante seemed to rally. He still seemed to be in some pain, but he also had a bit of an appetite and began drinking water on his own. I let him into the yard but locked his stall. He wanted to go in there and lie down, which would have been the wrong choice since we wanted him to pass manure and gas.

That afternoon, the vet called. She had taken a blood sample and said his protein was extremely low (2.5 when it should have been 6 to 8). She thought perhaps he had Potomac Horse Fever. He needed 5 days of IV antibiotics. If I paid $500 right then, and $400 more, they would treat him.

I don't like that vet very much because that is their M.O. Treat a horse, charge way too much for the treatment, and then say that more & expensive treatment can be had but only for cash on the table. They've done that before.

Thing is, I don't think he has Potomac Fever. He has chronic issues in his gut, as we already know. And gut issues can cause low blood protein. Why look any further? He probably had a bad bout with his ulcers because we went for a ride and left him behind (I had heard him banging on his stall as we rode up the driveway). He was so worked up and upset that he had an episode like many that we've nursed him through before. A GI leak of any kind lowers blood protein. What he needed for treatment was relief from pain, IV fluids as we did, and then as quick a return to peaceful, normal life as we could give him. So I thanked the vet and said I'm sorry, but I can't afford that treatment. We'll see what we can do with old farmer techniques.

So I brushed him more--lots more--to stimulate the autonomic nervous system and make him feel calm and happy. Then my brother in law helped me saddle Rocket, and Rocket and I led Dante on a nice, calm walk down to Mel's meadow. As we reached the meadow, Dante's mood changed. He relaxed and seemed very happy to be there. "Ah, home," his attitude said.

So Jack, Vegas, and Dante spent yesterday and the night before in the meadow. I brought them back last night. Dante was running in the meadow and seems a bit weakened but definitely over the episode. We'll continue our regimen as before, four feedings a day rather than two, hay or grass in front of him at all times, plenty of water, and that daily ride to keep him feeling like he has an important place in the world, a job to do.

Aside from that, the only news is that Rachelle has begun driving Jack with surcingle and reins. We also had him pulling the cart a little. He didn't seem to mind it until I sat on it, silly guy, and then he realized that he was pulling something.

It's quiet here without you and your family. The horses aren't being ridden as much, of course, with only two of us to ride (Danny and me). But Rachelle is here more often and it looks like Elizabeth is going to learn to ride. She rode Dante last week and had a lesson with Rachelle. That was really fun for her. We also went on a trail ride, Rocket leading Dante while Elizabeth rode him. Elizabeth took one tumble when Dante jumped a creek to keep up with Rocket, but she was all ready to keep up the riding lessons anyway.

Van is coming back, either next week or two weeks later, because my surgery is either next Friday or two Fridays later, depending on the health insurance.

I hope you've had a wonderful time in Canada, and we all think of you often as you begin another year of school. I am hoping so much that things go for you, Clementine, as you hope. It would be so lovely to have you living somewhere nearby as you go to college.

Beijos to you both,
Sheila

Still Reeling

2008-08-15T07:25:00.000-04:00

When I woke up this morning I had my normal thoughts about children, horses, what the day holds--and then I remembered yesterday's bad news.

I don't know how we're going to save Chiron's Grove. We were already struggling and trying to find ways to bring in more money. Now I don't see how we can stay here.

I talked to our landlord. He's willing to take less money temporarily, but eventually he will want to be paid back. He wants to find a way for us to work together.

But when I look at it dispassionately, the picture is grim. We don't have a car; I won't have the use of my right arm for months to come and even now deal with pain every day; and people are tightening their wallets and spending less on horses. I can't train without assistance.

However, if I move to a less expensive county, I run the risk of losing my children.

The bizarre thing is, the court ruling is based on the fact that the childrens' lifestyles are basically the same in both houses. But that was before the court lowered the child support payments. I don't understand, I don't understand....

Perhaps writing is a bad idea until I start feeling some hope. It seems right now that every effort I make, all the cleverness I apply in trying to maintain things for the kids, is just a new invitation for somebody to slam a big hammer down and pound us back into difficulties. And this injury doesn't help. It's just discouraging when you have to evaluate every move you make based on how much it's going to hurt: how to pick up the scoop, how to fill it, how to cut the bales open, how to lift a mug into the microwave, how to open the refrigerator or open a door. I've taught all the horses to let me lead them on the wrong side, bless their hearts, and they do seem to understand not to pull on me.

To my friends, I haven't forgotten that you're there. Your love and understanding are like balm. I need to figure out what to do, though, and one concern is that my problems don't affect your lives. Sometimes I feel like this vortex of misfortune that could suck you all in if you reached out to help me too much.

It's all a bit foggy, now. I can't see through to the next good place.

Right now, I guess, is about right now. It's about working and having breakfast and working some more. It will be about hoping the hay comes today and finding either Rachelle or somebody else to help me with some training tasks. Also about writing ads.

Might as well get started.

How Much Bad News Can One Divorce Make?

2008-08-14T12:50:00.000-04:00

1) My tenant has destroyed the house I rented to him. Holes in the wall, overflowing toilets, boarded up windows, trash packed into every corner, dog urine, black paint, broken appliances--you name it, he did it. So much for my only asset. I found this out today.

2) The magistrate, in her infinite wisdom, has decided against making the wealthy parent pay any more than the bare minimum the law requires for his children. Hence, our income is now reduced by $1600 per month. As of today.

So currently, I'm crying and reaching out to my friends. I have good friends. Isn't that enough to make up for the above?

Maybe I'll know later today. Just now, I'm reeling.

I went out and sat among the horses. They have a perspective on this stuff. Sniff sniff, they say. Then Munch munch, but not too far away. In their world, when somebody is upset, you just continue munching, but kinda close. Eventually the peace of the herd absorbs whatever agitation happened. You are not you, when you're in a herd. You are sort of you, but you are also wholly the herd. Two yous, in a way, but the lesser is absorbed by the greater consciousness. This removes your burdens. Munch munch in the rhythm of the herd. Grass is good, flies are bad, water is delicious and we love the giver of the grain when she gives it. When she's sad, we care, but munch munch and swish swish. Around her.

Alone at Home (Sort of )

2008-08-14T10:27:00.000-04:00

Magic and I went for a ride on Amigo and Rocket yesterday. We did the loop--the one with the most beautiful views in the world. Amigo did all right. He was pretty pokey at first, but once we left the road he perked up and was able to catch up within a minute or two of any given run. He did his rocking horse canter. Magic said he was a lot of work at first, needing so much urging, but then he was ok.

Back from the ride, tired, feeding the horses.... and afterwards Memphis decided to go explore the field next door. Now, the next door neighbors see nothing nice about having horses grazing their field that they pay to have brush-hogged, so they have put up a fence between the properties to keep our horses out if they break through my fence. But they did a lousy job. The fence is so high that Memphis went right under it. Took her about 10 seconds to get past it. So I sighed and went after her, caught her, and tried to bring her back. Nothing doing. The fence was very easy to go under when you are going where you want to go, but pony style, Memphis was positive that going under the fence the other way was completely impossible. So all my ignorant and self-centered neighbors managed to accomplish was to make it harder for me to get any breakaways off their property.

I flipped the house the bird, unfastened the fence at one of its many weak points, led Memphis home and fed the herd. Then I trudged back out there and fixed the fence where I had unfastened it, rather regretting the bird-flipping.

The people who live in that house have no idea that the whole meadow the house sits in was once the main meadow for my barn. And they don't care. The fact that they have a large field that they pay to have mowed, while I struggle daily to move my horses a much further distance along the road, has nothing to do with them, really, and I do get that. But Vermont is changing. The farmers who have made Vermont what it is are having very hard times continuing to defend their livelihoods as they are pushed slowly off their lands by wealthy flatlanders who have come here to enjoy the beauty they are strangling.

But they have a legal right to do this. The woman next door has so much money that all she has to do is wish for something and it happens. I struggle for heat and hot water, and sometimes don't have them. I have no car because I had to sell mine when the crazy court system took a wild turn on my case. I'm facing painful surgery and dramatically reduced functioning for at least 3 months and probably longer. If they were to let my horses graze their field, the horses would be safer, I would have hours less of work, and so on. But they prefer their privacy, and really I have no right even to think enviously how their land could make my life easier. I don't even know why I do it. I'm the one in the wrong here, not they. But still, I think that if the shoe were on the other foot, I could teach them a thing or two about neighborliness.

Mel, on the other hand, is about as good a neighbor as a person could possibly want. She has offered us her large meadow, and been patient while we deal with fencing issues. She is okay with us using her water source, even her electricity to charge the fence. All of this from the goodness of her heart. Magic and Alan have one of my horses on their land and they take care of him as well as I would.

I guess that's life. People are people. You take them as they come, and try not to resent too much the impact privilege and insulated attitudes have on those of us who hold our lives together sometimes with a wish and a roll of scotch tape.

It's the American way, this individualism. Supposedly. Every man for himself.

Except sometimes.

Amigo Takes a Giant Leap

2008-08-13T09:03:00.000-04:00

I've been wanting to write about this since it happened.

This is a picture of Amigo, and he is the star of this story.

Nina (our young French friend from the Seraphim family) and I went for a trail ride on Rocket (me) and Amigo (her). We rode over to Alan & Magic's place, up past their house and into the woods that Woody and Andy own. Then we rode down the trail and around, following Lewis Creek. It was hot and buggy, but riding is always fun so we sweated in the sun by the creek as we walked. But then I had this brilliant idea: to cross Lewis Creek and make a beeline for home. I was sure that home was straight...that way.

I asked Nina, what do you think? Right across the stream there is a trail that will take us straight home. Want to try crossing. She shrugged and said, "Why not?"

So I picked a spot that looked shallow. The creek is very full from all the rain we've had, so this wasn't easy. But below a dam looked pretty good. Rocket picked his way down to the water, sniffed it, walked slowly in, and then picked up speed as the water got deeper, and deeper, and then I thought, "Oh, please, don't fill up my boots!" but it did. And then I was just hoping that the saddle wouldn't go under, but it did, and the next thing, I'm up to my chest in water, Rocket has nothing but his nose out & forward as he strikes out for the opposite bank. A few seconds later he found ground under his feet and heaved us up and into the trees on the opposite side. I turned around to see how Amigo was doing, just in time to see him land in the middle of the creek as Nina slid off to the side. The splash was like the biggest cannonball you ever heard. Wild-eyed, Amigo struck out for where he'd seen his buddy disappear into the trees and heaved himself across in about a second, he was so scared. The poor guy apparently thought he could jump over, and was freaked out to find himself in water. Nina swam philosophically to the shore while Rocket and I cornered Amigo. She got out, started wringing out her shirt, and remarked in her French accent, "I took a bath."

God I love trail rides. All the way home, I kept giggling.

Why I Haven't Written Much Lately

2008-08-10T12:13:00.000-04:00

Apparently my shoulder is pretty badly torn up due to a fall in my driveway this past April (yes, it was still icy). It has three separate injuries that I've circled.

How I've managed to get along since April with a shoulder that messed up is a story of good friends and farm employees stepping in to fill the void. It's also a story of denial: each day I woke up to pain and spent the day in pain encouraging every thought that it was a little better than yesterday, maybe, and ignoring impulses to stop doing the things that are a part of my life at Chiron's Grove. It is a story too of Van becoming gradually more insistent that something be done, and finally of having such a bad week that I gave in and went to see Bunky Bernstein, my doctor and near neighbor. Then came the MRI--a desperate expense--and finally the diagnosis and the plan. Fortunately, Mel (of Mel's Meadow, where we keep the horses when the fences are in good repair) tracked down the information I needed to get health insurance through a program in the state of Vermont that is offering financial help and covering preexisting conditions. Every time I talk to her, Mel has another idea for making sure I find the help I need.

So here is the plan: surgery as soon as the insurance is in place, followed by two weeks of mostly pain management, followed by another four weeks of keeping my arm in the sling, followed by a year of rehabilitation before reaching a point of maximum use (note that this is not the same as full recovery--apparently the biceps tendon will be in a new place and one or two other changes will be permanent).

The farm can't survive this unless I do the hard thing and ask my friends to help. So here it is, to all and sundry, a request for help. What I need is for anybody who can to come and stay for a week or so with me during the first several months of this saga, to help with moving hay and water and mucking out stalls, to ride the horses (if you can), and to help with training and spoiling my diverse herd.

I will be selling as many horses and ponies I can, but the basic three will remain: Dante (whom I love and whom Danny rides), Rocket (who is Van's horse), and Meg (who isn't here yet, but who is to be my long-awaited endurance trail horse).

The others are all for sale: Memphis ($4500), Vegas ($950), Jack ($950), and Cocoa ($1250). Their descriptions are on our website under "Horses for Sale."

My Goal

2008-08-10T12:09:00.000-04:00

Since I was a little girl, I've wanted to ride like this.

But the real dream, the romantic dream that is almost embarrassing to admit, is to be able to ride like this on long trail rides that last days and lead to places few people have seen.

Let it be so, some day.

Rocket

2008-07-20T13:28:00.000-04:00

Rocket has settled in nicely. He is calm in the stall, though he prefers if one of us is in there with him and calls to us if we leave him. I kept him company for about an hour, just to get the bond going. Smart guy--he has associated car motors with the possibility of his friend coming back & whinnies when he hears a car.

So far the only real problem I see with him is that he's head-shy. We've brushed him and started teaching him a few things (like "head down"). He catches on quickly & likes the challenge. He's respectful and attentive. Lots of good stuff going on for him.

Next exercise: walking down on the ring. He needs to be easy to catch & I hear that he's not.

Cocoa--What's Next

2008-07-10T21:04:00.000-04:00

I called a trainer friend of mine to talk about (among other things) the quality of Cocoa's connection with people. It's fleeting. He has done so well at learning to be led, learning to listen to commands in the ring (offline, even), and so on. But he doesn't want to take the next step. My friend said, "Have you had his teeth checked?"

His teeth! Of course! He has a tooth-ache! Now that I think about it, that would totally explain his withdrawal and grumpiness. Imagine if you had a full-time, painful toothache and somebody was asking you to walk, trot, canter, now let me get on your back. I think I'd kick the person. Cocoa is long past wanting to kick people (he was a bit psycho when he came here, though), but his general surliness, and that way he has of pushing his head up against me like, "Make it feel better,"--it all fits. It also explains the fact that he hasn't gained weight as much as I would have expected given his diet.

I know how this fell through the cracks--the first vet checks he had when he first came were done under duress while he was still wild.

So the call has gone out to the dentist. And a new note goes on the training program master document: dental check-ups at the earliest possible time.

What a thought.

Strange Visitors and Even Stranger Reception

2008-07-10T20:44:00.000-04:00

I heard this strange clicking sound, nails on metal doorjamb, and looked up from my work at the dining room table to see what looked like miniature dinosaurs (you have to see these creatures close up--and this is an old picture. They're bigger and the red part on their faces has gotten all hoary).

The ducks had come to tea.
So I snuck out of the dining room and around to the study for my camera. Danny was in the kitchen cooking something. As I went by, I said, "Danny, walk slowly and quietly into the dining room." All children respond to a conspiratorial whisper, so he dropped what he was doing and walked towards the dining room immediately. I continued towards the study.

Then I hear this:

"AAAAAHHHH!"

THUD! (Long practice has trained my ear to this sound. It is Danny falling over from pure astonishment. Unfortunately, this happens to him a lot).

Various rummaging sounds (Danny getting to his feet and probably gathering whatever he had thrown into the air [another astonishment reflex]).

Stomp stomp stomp.

Loud hissing (this from the ducks).

"AAAh, AAAHHH! Get OUT!!!" (this from Danny).

"Danny, don't--I want to get a pic--"

SLAMM.

"Danny!" I wailed. "I wanted a picture of that!"

No response but a true and deadly Danny scowl.

Stomp stomp stomp.

Then, from over his shoulder, as heavy a truth as a rock through water: "Ducks don't belong in the house."

I just stood there, with my camera hanging limply at my side.

Sigh.

I guess it's too much to hope that my children would share my love of the completely unusual.... and they would be really shocked to find out how much that love has helped me survive parenthood.

Ta-da!

2008-07-05T09:55:00.000-04:00

Isn't she cute? I love the way she tosses her head whenever she makes a good jump. Next steps for Memphis: w/t/c under saddle. She does the w/t very well, but the canter is a bit iffy. But what a canter! Totally smooth. I could hardly believe it the first time she did it.

Question is, do I continue w/bareback or use the english saddle today?

(Later: I used the English saddle. She did great at w/t/c. Transitions need work, but hey. She's only just getting started.)

Ducklings Doing Okay

2008-06-30T09:05:00.000-04:00

They're sharing Little Pig's pen in the kitchen. What a strange group they are when they huddle around Little Pig for warmth (Little Pig is a guinea pig). We still have 11 ducklings now and they look pretty good and seem contented. Side effect: the fly population in the kitchen has suffered considerably. Even at this age the ducklings can pluck them right out of the air for a quick snack.

News about Amigo and the Ducklings

2008-06-29T15:13:00.000-04:00

Amigo has been out three times this week. The first was last Wednesday, and wow was it easy to tell he hadn't been ridden in a while (I'd been away). He got upset very easily. I tried to push him through it, but he started to tremble & that's dangerous. So I changed the pace. Apparently, he needs time to consider things, and if he's pushed before he takes the time to think about a new situation, he first begins to tremble, and then he will in desperation begin evasive maneouvres. So for the rest of the ride I tried letting him consider things before responding to queues. This worked pretty well for him on that ride.

Yesterday I took him out again, this time without another horse to follow. He balked a fair amount. For the first part of the ride he was allowed to think about things, but for the second part I was pushing him through balks that seemed to have no reason. I used the reins to very gently slap him on the shoulder or rump (it was more like a tickle); this annoyed him enough that he began to move each time it happened. He still will hardly canter for me, but I was very pleased that he has begun going willingly through creeks. He even went right into a dark treeline, down a steep hill, over a creek, and up again in a place where almost every horse I've ridden there has needed me to lead him through the first time. I was very, very pleased when he did that. It shows real willingness.

In the middle of our ride, in a large meadow where nobody ever goes, we got soaked with a driving rain. It's been a long time since I've been riding on a sopping wet horse with rain streaming through my hair and down my face. I'd forgotten how wonderful it can feel. Both he and I enjoyed the relief from flies and heat.

Today we went out again, with Molly riding Ben. Amigo did many things very well on this ride. First, he went through the covered bridge (where he had refused before) without any hesitation, though he did arch his neck, snort, and step very high. Second, he was the hero of the day when he plunged into Lewis Creek with me on his back. He went straight for the deepest part of the creek. The water came up to my shins. Ben had been refusing to go down, but once Amigo was in, he followed and went right through it, too. This cut off nearly a mile of the ride on the way home. I was very happy with him for doing that. Lastly, he let me wash him with the hose and stood still for it. He has learned so much!

On the other hand, he still likes to balk and can do a very annoying walk that is something of a meander. Instead of going straight, each step he looks for a way to change the momentum to going back the other way. This is definitely not "going forward willingly."

About the ducklings--we have lost 3 of them to some kind of illness. One more doesn't look as energetic as the others, and I fear this is the next one to go. What a shame.

A Conversation with my Boyfriend (or, Yes, it is About the Farm)

2008-06-26T18:17:00.000-04:00

Van and I usually stay sort of "connected" online most of each work day. Here is a bit of today:

SB: hey, van?
what's the difference between html and xml?
Van: html is one kind of xml
SB: can xml be opened in firefox?
Van: usually
Van: ie too
SB: thx
Van: sure

Later...

SB: whoa, we just had some drama on the farm
Van: oh yeah?
SB: big fuss among the chickens, so i went running out
saw a bobcat standing between the barn & the paddock
: looking at the ducks & chickens
: they were all squawking and hissing
Van: damn
: but the bobcat looked at me, then turned & ambled--ambled!--into the woods
: so casual, like, okay, this one's yours
Van: heh
SB: so i went back inside
: and a few hours later (30 min ago)
: the same kerfuffle in the barn
: i went running out, and so did Danny, picking up a stick on his way
: actually, before i ran out i looked out the window & saw the same bobcat
: in the paddock this time
: with a white rooster in its mouth, dragging the rooster along
: that's when we went running out
: Danny with his stick
: i said, Danny, I'm not comfortable with you taking on a full grown bobcat, stand down, let me go first
: he very reluctantly let me go first
: but by the time we got to the gate into the Home Meadow,
: all we could see was a trail of white feathers.
: Bobcat, 4 (this week!)
: Me, 1
: The brown duck is missing
: the guinea hen is missing
: the mother duck is missing
: and now the white rooster
: so i knocked on matt's door
: and told him he was down by one rooster
: he said
: "Sei la vie."
: (or however that is spelled)
: we had a conference
: the two of us decided to keep the last rooster here (he has a friend who wants it)
: so that, when the bobcat comes back (note that I didn't say "if")
: he will get the rooster and leave my ducks alone
: Now, that's neighborly.
: dontcha think?
Van: heh

Ducklings, etc.

2008-06-25T11:54:00.000-04:00

Ducks grow exponentially. Each day they almost double in size. Ours are doing fine, despite the fact that we haven't a clue as to how to raise them. But somehow they are getting enough food and water and warmth and space.

Yesterday Rachelle and I took pictures of Jack, as you can see. He's become quite the looker.

Dante had his hoof trimmed yesterday and is already walking much better. I plan to take him to Mel's Meadow in an hour or so; he should probably just be on turnout for a while until he starts to run around on his own.

Later... Well, he couldn't quite make the trip. He wanted to, but after limping along a bit he went back to the barn. I guess he's still a little sore. So only Ben went.

On my way back I got some photos of the children hanging around with the ducklings. Actually, with the ducklings + 1. Somebody else was soaking up some rays.

All the animals feel safe around Danny. And he's just happy with his book...

Some People...

2008-06-24T10:30:00.000-04:00

Fleetfoot Jack's previous owner showed up in a pickup truck with a horse trailer behind him and got out and demanded that I give him "his pony." Jack was nowhere in sight, otherwise I expect he would have loaded him up just that instant. In fact, now that I think about it, I bet he thought Jack would be in the Top Meadow, away from the house, and had planned to just take him from there without saying anything at all.

Wow. Fleetfoot Jack, a.k.a. Odin, came to us ill and contagious in mid-November 2007. I asked the owner to come and get him and left a check in the barn to pay him for some hay he had delivered. He never showed up and never replied. All but one of our horses became very ill with strangles, and little Jack suffered some pretty severe symptoms. So I paid the vet bills, and fed the little guy all winter, and tamed & began his training with the help of the children, and now that he's worth some money, the owner wants him back.

What is the right answer here? Shall I bill the owner for six and a half months of board? That's, let's see, $1625. The vet bill was gosh, for Jack alone it was probably only about $200, but for the other horses that he contaminated it was much, much more, perhaps thousands. I doubt I can get the owner to pay for the other horses' vet bills, but I suppose that depends on who actually "owns" the pony.

Anyway, I called the state police because the guy said he had called the state police, and they said they never heard of him. I mentioned that I didn't want this man on my property and that I doubted he would have pulled this kind of prank had there been a big man living here along with us, and they said that if he ever came back I should call them right away.

Never a dull moment....

Mama Duck Disappeared

2008-06-23T15:03:00.000-04:00

We have no idea what happened to her. She's just gone. And one duckling is gone, too. Actually, Lucy found its little body, trampled by a horse hoof. They were on their own for a few hours after their mother disappeared and before we knew anything was wrong. The boys don't know about the trampled duckling; I'm letting them just guess until I can figure out the best way to tell them. Not, for example, while I'm trying to slog my way through a day's work.

Dante is limping painfully as the crack moves down his hoof. Cordell is coming tomorrow to trim & remove the shoe. I tried to do it last night but I don't know how to do it without hurting Dante.

Cocoa and Amigo are in Mel's Meadow today. We have to get there by going on a trail through the woods. That should be interesting come winter...

All I have time for now.