Anna Blake's Blog, page 44

Photo & Poem: Wild and Tame

 

You’ve landed in a place you don’t

belong, the cat let me know, as she

howled at you on the wrong side of

the window sill, trees and sky just a

transparent wall away. A big squawk

for a small feathered thing. I excused

the cat so we could be alone. Turning

your dark eyes on me, beak wide to

breathe, to threaten me. Proud little life,

no bigger than mine, I hear you out,

still my rattle, and finally move to help,

but my hand is your terror. Reaching

for Rachael’s book from my bag to

the window sill, and you are happy to

step on, then turned to an edge for a

perch. Exhale and float the book higher,

up and through the angle of the window.

Triangles of blue and black feathers,

a vulnerable bit of white at your throat,

and a beak as long as your angular wing,

my friend, you are free. Eyes meeting

again, slow seconds as we take stock of

each other. Lifting an opalescent wing to

air, he’s away in a swirl of wild and tame.

…

Anna Blake at Infinity Farm

Join us at The Barn, our online training group at annablake.com

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Can a Horse Try Too Hard?

It was the first day of a Calming Signals clinic. I was talking to a group of people about leading from behind and my demo horse stood at the end of my rope, a gelding as bright as a penny. It felt like he was familiar to the people watching and they wanted to see me work with him. When that happens, it could go either way. I had a few words to say before beginning and he was restless, so I gave him a bit more room, stepping back and letting my body turn away slightly. I meant to give him room to settle but instead, he marched to a pedestal a few feet away and stepped up. It was facing the crowd and they laughed and cheered for him.

I smiled, ready to congratulate him for upstaging me, but when I looked over to him, front feet up and standing tall, I saw his furrowed brow, his tense poll, and the sour slight-twist of his ears. People were charmed by him, he’d made the choice to do the “trick” on his own, and now was showing calming signals that were a bit unhappy. If I had to put human words to the feeling I got, it would have been, “Am I good? Do you like me now?”

Some people would love to have a horse who behaved like a self-driving car but there was something about him that made me sad. Had he repeated this trick so often that he did it by rote? Was it a free choice or a worn habit? People continued to say how special he was, and I certainly took no credit. I had done nothing, and we were not working together in the least. He shifted his feet an inch, as if to refresh the pose. That’s it; he was posing for the crowd and almost desperate for a reward. I’d seen this kind of look on a dog; that feeling that they’ve tried so hard they almost burst with the desire to please.

Is this a normal behavior for a horse? It’s a valuable question in a moment like this. Sometimes what looks cute or like a funny face is one of anxiety. We can think it’s clever that a horse picks up his rope and chews on it, perhaps pretending he’s bringing it to us, when it could be a sign of something more serious.

Insecurity can show as a shy unwillingness to try but also the other extreme, bravado is a kind of insecurity as well. Sometimes it shows as bully behavior, or like this horse, what we might call being “teacher’s pet.” He tries too hard, then keeps on trying. He doesn’t think he’s enough.

When I begin with a demo horse on the ground, I usually ask for something with a cue I think he might not know. I’m not trying to trip him up, I hope to engage him honestly. If his owner is close, they may see what I’m asking for and tell me the cue they use to get the horse to do the behavior. It’s natural for a human to speak up, too. We humans are result oriented and any owner wants their horse to look good.

How did the obstacle become more important than the conversation? How did the result become more important than the relationship?

Back to the pedestal and the good gelding. I ask him to back off the pedestal by shifting my weight from one foot to the other. He poses harder, planted and uncertain what I want. A huge improvement; he’s thinking about what I’m asking. A big exhale from me, to let him know he’s on the right track. Reward a horse for thinking every time, a thinking horse is a positive horse. I shift again, this time one foot shifts back an inch and I let my weight go to that foot. He shifts his weight and he gets a huge exhale from me. Isn’t this how a dance begins?

I had an idea that he was previously cued with the rope to his face, because that’s what humans do; we “talk” with our hands. Getting down from the pedestal should be the easy part, but he’s waiting to have his face pulled and I won’t. Horses begin all their movement with their feet; moving together as a herd begins with a weight shift. My feet communicate all I need them to, and I trust the gelding will hear them. Am I a genius? No, just bilingual.

Meanwhile, he is locked on me, totally engaged. At this point, I have everything I want. His ears are curious, the previous anxiety is gone, and he’s focused on our conversation. Instead of an answer by rote, we’re together in this endeavor and the result doesn’t matter.

I ask for his eye and he arcs his neck toward me slightly. The people watching have become invisible to him. His ears are soft, his breathing has returned. He looks, well, normal. This time my foot slides six inches back and in the same instant, on an untouched slack rope, he follows me back, matching my movement, the most natural thing for a horse to do.

Now he’s on the ground facing the pedestal and I’m asking him to walk on. He can tell I don’t mean to step up again, so he waits for me to tell him right or left, to cue his face. I want a partner and that means we both get to choose, so another breath, “walk on.” A small furrow to the eyebrow and he shifts his weight just enough to loosen the front hoof closest to me. Another exhale; I want tiny bite-size answers. He wasn’t confident standing on that block earlier and I want him to know he’s getting it right, even if he’s just thinking in that direction. I’m ready for him, my weight on one foot, and when he takes that stride left, away from the pedestal, I’m out of his space and ready to go with him.

The world changes, not by huge flamboyant party tricks but by finding a small instant of oneness or connection or any of those big words that mean nothing to a horse.

Bright as a penny, the gelding gives a little lick as his jaw relaxes, as eloquent as our feet to the earth.

…

Anna Blake at Infinity Farm

Join us at The Barn, our online training group at annablake.com

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Photo & Poem: Known

Across the long diagonal to the west corner of
the dry lot, he’s on the far side of the herd,
barely moving as he shifts weight from one
hoof to the other, his neck stretched long,

muzzle to the sandy ground. He pretends to
eat what’s not there, so he can watch me softly.
He sees as much with his ear as that dark eye.
I return the gentle half-glance, indirect yet

intimate as a secret breath, feeling my feet shift
after his in this walk of stillness. We could not
be closer, old friend, as a meadowlark trills from
a faded gray fencepost, with nothing to prove.

…

Anna Blake at Infinity Farm

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The Horse Trainer and the Dermatologist.

My gray mare calming signals included squinty eyes, a dry mouth, and a weird chicken-like movement with my neck and head. Every now and then one of my naked feet would kick out. Breathing? Not noticeably.

If there is a medical visit I like even less than a mammogram, it’s going to the dermatologist. I know that women of a certain age who talk about their doctor visits and odd ailments are the worst company. Just stop reading here, because I have a growth acquired from my last visit and I feel like dissecting it and maybe cauterizing it when I’m done.

I was late coming to dermatology. Acne was not my worst problem in high school. As years passed, I avoided cosmetic conversations. I had horses and an occupation that involved being noisy and dirty. I defied facials and manicures. Between being a goldsmith, riding outside daily, and living in a dry climate, well, I had to let something go.  Suffice it to say I could file a hoof with my bare hands.

Ignorance catches up eventually, about too much sun and the medical specialty that is much more than beauty tips. My first visit was for a “flaky thing” beside my eyebrow.  I heard the term “Pre-Cancerous” for the first time and out came the liquid nitrogen canister, giving me the worst ice-cream headache ever, followed with a serious scolding about sunscreen. It felt a midlife version of Scared Straight.

I told him, I wore sunscreen. Like butter on toast. “How many hours a day are you outside?” he asked. Not impressed with my job, he figured being a horse trainer was like being at the beach all day and scolded me about not wearing a hat.

Does he have any idea how often I rant about helmets, the best hat ever made? But it’s true, I struggle with other hats. In some parts of the horse world, the hat you wear is like a membership card to another culture, a riding discipline, or a fan club. None of which I belong to but after a lifetime of snarling at the affectation of hat wearing, I gave in. Especially after a particularly itchy “flaky thing” was frozen off the top of my skull. I still struggle with the politics of hat wearing.

My doctor was a polite man, rabbit-like but in the best Disney way. He wears a headlight with a magnifier on it and he uses all the big words about skin. Do you sometimes do an ordinary thing but in hindsight, the experience feels surreal? In the same way that you have a cell phone, but Star Trek was science fiction at one point? Only dermatology can feel like a lifestyle indictment if you aren’t careful.

The visit starts with the usual open back medical gown pulled around as I sit on the special chair. Looking down, it appears I’m wearing a straight skirt which would be weird enough, but my feet don’t touch the ground, so things are contradictory already. The doctor and his assistant come in, he adjusts the headlight/magnifier and leaning in close, starts calling out impossibly complicated words to his assistant at the computer. He checks my scalp in that way chimps do in the jungle. He scrutinizes scar on my nose, my forehead wrinkles, my jowls, calling out imperfection after imperfection. This is the easy part.

“Please stand up.” It’s his job to scrutinize every inch of skin; my arms, my back, the skin that used to flow seductively to my cleavage that now looks like an animal print, burned seasonally for too many years. With a subtle balance of shy curiosity and slight discomfort, he calls out scars and imperfections, peering in and around my underwear.

There’s that moment when you know you have some semblance of sanity, or at least inevitability, that comes with being a woman of a certain age. To have every inch of my body mercilessly judged with a headlight and magnifier would have killed me when I was a teenager. Obsessing about my “ugly body” was a full-time dysfunction then. I was normal, in other words.

“You can sit again.” Scrutinizing my thighs, the dent where that mare landed her hoof leaving me with tingly nerve damage, my spider veins creeping in all directions, the dry spot on the outside of my calf that my boots rub. Whose legs are these, attached but unrecognizable?

“It looks like a podiatrist got hold of your foot.” Smiling at me, almost in a Prince Charming/glass slipper position. I tell him four screws, a fencing staple, and a lever. He takes a minute to translate my language to his as he checks between my toes. I’d been greasing up my heels for the last two weeks, so that could have been worse.

Finally, seeing his soft hands holding mine, maybe the most sobering moment. He studies, finger by finger, as if checking that I’ve washed them well. I feel small, almost apologetic. There are no current bruises on the back of my hand, but he mentions an elongated s-shaped scar. “Fencing wire,” I reply. He examines the pinky joint that’s frozen and numb. The new black fingernail, a slight curve to that newly-numb joint on the opposite ring finger. “Caught in a fence panel,” I report. He tells me that bump on the middle finger is a recurring cyst in a joint. It leaks clear gel, I know what that means from my amateur vet status. Then the thick ridges on my thumbnails. He finishes, more big words for his assistant, and it’s over.

I feel a bit more chipper after this ordeal. I had been testy after getting a stack of fan mail from Medicare this last month. Being taken on a road trip over the uneven terrain of my scars and numb areas has a different effect on me now that horses and farm life have dismissed any vanity I might have had. Good riddance.

Instead, this gratitude for the job my skin has done, holding me together through this wild life. I’ll trade a few stiff joints for the lessons learned. Scars are forgiven for the light they have let inside. It’s been a rough week on our little planet and maybe the best “revenge” is to not be taken over by numbness but to be sensitized by what may not be felt directly. Humbled by my good fortune, and holding a space for healing with each breath, I’m sending every good wish to those feeling sadness and loss.

…

Anna Blake at Infinity Farm

Join us at The Barn, our online training group at annablake.com

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Photo & Poem: Waiting Out the Storm

 

Rusty coat, a spiky mane, and a spotted blanket, he

would have been a firecracker of a colt, plain to see

who he once was. After coming here, he took the risk,

slowly lowering to the ground, his tense head high. Even

longer to let lie his wary reluctance to touch; he kept

himself apart. Careful steps over winter ice, matching

his small strides, we let him be. Spring is the violent

season, cyclone winds pushing trees down, bare dirt

stripped and snow drifts rolled high, the gelding pressed

in a shelter, a goat wedged half-under him. He was covered

in ice-balls, shivering but gazing at me with silent eyes. No

complaint. The entire herd stoic, as I apologized for what

I couldn’t control, feeding extra hay, dragging gallons of

water upwind, only to find it later, dirty and frozen. My

strength gone to stillness in the house, sharing their silence

from a blind window. The storm rages, we stand and wait.

…

Anna Blake at Infinity Farm

Join us at The Barn, our online training group at annablake.com

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Horses in Solitary.

This is my fence panel. I lost count of the other’s just like it, eight, I think. I find them this way, the top rail bent practically in half, edges collapsed. I hear no loud noises, there are no lumps or marks, I just come out to find one or two of the draft-cross geldings standing by them looking innocent. They think it’s all my fault for isolating them in this cruel way for a few hours overnight. They play all day, share hay, nap within inches of each other, and then I do the unthinkable. Separate them when they party like frat boys.

I’ve also lost count of the number of requests from readers for my thoughts about keeping a single horse, too. I think people ask because they have a neighbor or a friend who doesn’t understand or won’t listen. Maybe they drive by a sad singleton. Last year, a horse appeared in a pasture of weeds down the road from us. Skinny, tall and black, he was there with a big bale of hay and a tub of water. He gained weight but never really looked any better. One day he was gone and I’m sorry to say I was relieved.

My research included an article written by a vet who said owning a single horse was “acceptable.” She’s right, it doesn’t kill them. The same search yielded a new article about prisons that claims, “Placing prisoners in solitary confinement is tantamount to torture and it needs to stop.” Humans have been studying the negative psychological and physiological effects of solitary confinement on inmates since the 1830s but we still do it, every state and each prison. We know the mental damage caused by isolation. We aren’t hoping for rehabilitation, we mean to punish prisoners as harshly as we can, even juveniles and people with mental illness.

In the horse world, we try to do our best. We love our horses and the excuses we have for keeping one in solitary confinement are mixed in with finances, convenience, and not understanding what it means. If their ribs don’t show and their hooves are trimmed, it’s easier to look past who horses were meant to be. After all, he isn’t being overtly abused or on a slaughter truck.

If horses are allowed to have their own lives, beyond the part they play in our lives a couple of hours a day, we must truly accept and value what it means to be a horse, rather than anthropomorphize their reality into something convenient to us. Loving horses takes no special skill. Respecting them as sentient beings is a whole other thing.

To know a horse is to profoundly understand they are prey animals. Domestication doesn’t change that.

A normal horse is never alone by choice. Horses naturally live in herds. There is safety, meaning the more sets of eyes watching for predators, giving more time to search for food, as well as time to lie down to rest, knowing others are on guard. They understand that individuals are more visible and vulnerable than a group. Prey animals crave safety in a chaotic world and work together for that goal.

Horses are also social animals, science has proven they are sentient with emotions.  They form family bonds and mourn change and loss. Foals run races, adults mutually groom, and elders stand, head nearly touching another’s flank, passing hours in shared, peaceful company.

Humans need to be careful as we try to understand other species; we only have our own human perceptions to understand with, but that can’t be taken to mean other species define things the same way we do. That said, I think the concept of a herd for a horse is synonymous with home, or in the best sense, family, as we understand it. In other words, the foundation of everything.

But because it flatters us to be in partnership with horses, we can never think we are herd-mates, any more than putting on a flamingo t-shirt makes us a big pink bird.

It is their instinct to be with horses. They need each other more than they need us, even if we feed them. They need each other even more than we need them. Make all the excuses you want, love them more than anything, but they can tell we aren’t horses.

What does isolation do? Horses can become emotionally numb, experiencing anxiety and depression. Some will remain stoic because a prey animal that shows weakness will stand out to predators. So, they pose with dull eyes, bored into a stupor. Of course, they appear happy to see humans, but for all the wrong reasons.

Some horses stereotype; a stereotype is a dysfunctional behavior based on a natural behavior that’s become distorted by stress, to become a self-soothing action. It could be fence pacing or cribbing or weaving. Physical issues follow emotional issues, including chronic tension, lameness, and of course, ulcers.

How often do we look at a horse’s behavior and think training is needed rather than hearing their call for help? How often do we fight with a horse about separation anxiety, (their unwillingness to leave the herd,) because we think we deserve something for the hay we buy? Training methods will never replace a horse’s need for a herd. The best we can hope for is to create a confident horse willing to trust us for a while, but if there is no herd waiting in the background, it will crumble.

I know the challenge of what horses cost, the commitment needed to own even one. Is seeing that horse out the window worth the price he pays? Especially when the world is full of foster horses who need homes and affordable boarding facilities with the company your horse needs. Does seeing it from the horse’s side help or hurt?

We humans are imperfect, doing our best, and yet some parents keep hungry children in cages. Certainly, that must carry more importance. We need to show each other more compassion and less personal judgment, but so much is also told about us by how we treat animals. Just because we aren’t the very worst doesn’t mean we can’t do better, raise the standard, and in the process, lift humanity a bit as well.

Can you keep a single horse? It’s legal. Solitary confinement doesn’t kill them. Not all at once.

…

Anna Blake at Infinity Farm

Join us at The Barn, our online training group at annablake.com

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Photo & Poem: Burning Snow

 

Nature swats at the pasty insects fussing with

watch stems, adjusting mechanical time. Taking

one hour, exactly sixty minutes, from one edge of

a day and self-importantly tacking it to the other,

a legal act lost on horses, who keep time by

the feel of the soil, bucking wild at the scent of

green just coming, watching as the Canada geese

return to the pond, skidding along the dirty-gray

ice toward a few inches of water shadowing the

shore. Please stay, claim this place for your young.

Two pair survey the flow to the trees, keep watch

back to the unsettled herd, as the reliable gray drops

and rolls, leaving a white hair outline on the ground,

his tense flank the truest barometer of the unsettled

changes ahead. Winds that howl through the barn,

sending hay scraps to cracked dry ground, teasing

the look of grass. Winds that pause at dawn, respecting

the gypsy sun making its way north, throwing colors

to burn the snow, wet the soil, and call out the task of

rebirth, as city bugs complain of mud on their shoes.

…

Anna Blake at Infinity Farm

Join us at The Barn, our online training group at annablake.com

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Creativity and the Problem with Training Techniques.

We were standing around the barn after the vet had left, a group of trainers and riders and horses, telling stories and laughing. I can’t remember what I said now, but the European trainer got suddenly serious with me, saying “You know there is only one right way to train that, don’t you?” I don’t remember what was said after that. The sentence shocked me, the accent made me feel scolded.

When I started back with horses after leaving home, I had two geldings who were as different as black and white. Some of it was physical; not the same conformation or size or age, but their personalities were polar opposites, too. One was arrogant and one had no confidence. One was always too quick and one liked to “conserve energy.” One was food aggressive and one wandered away from his grain. One way to train? I hadn’t even had one way to tack up.

The European trainer worked with nice horses, who performed well or flunked out. In a way, it wasn’t the worst thing. If you don’t feel you can get a good result with a horse, it’s best to say so. Most of the horses I trained came with a “history”, which is a code word for coming apart before, and an owner who wasn’t ready to give up. Good clients for me since I’m the sort who won’t flunk a horse out.

What do you do if quitting the horse isn’t an option? Some ask for advice and get fifty opinions claiming there is just one thing that will work, but they all contradict each other. Some will search the internet for a simple answer, trying a different technique every day for a month, but ending up with the same dazed and confused look their horse has. Frustration rules, they plead to the sky, a trainer, or the barn cat, “Just tell me what to do!”

The problem with a canned training technique, whether it’s an old DVD or on YouTube, is that it’s all great if your horse does the identical thing that the horse in the video does. But if your horse gives a different answer, you’re stuck. We must understand the “why” underlying the technique before attempting the “how,”  to ensure we don’t damage our horses.

Seeing a training issue from the horse’s side, it’s almost as if the human says something like, “Where is North Dakota?” and looks expectantly at the horse, who doesn’t have any idea. The human has been taught to escalate cues if the horse is resistant and soon the human’s voice has gone harsh, a whip might be tapping somewhere, and no one is breathing. It’s an impasse, the human can’t back down, now yelling, “Where is North Dakota?” and the horse is moving into his sympathetic nervous system, the flight/fight/freeze mode. No good learning can happen now.

This isn’t abuse, it’s just the nature of a human working against the nature of a horse.

Let’s say you know better than getting a stronger bit or wearing spurs. How to proceed? Stop fighting! It takes real leadership skill to wage peace. It means we prioritize the horse over our emotions. This is an acquired skill, it takes practice.

First and always, make good and sure the horse is sound. Don’t assume it, horses aren’t natural fighters and most of the time resistance comes from pain. Then get mentally engaged with the idea of how horses learn. Think less about an answer by rote and more about learning to communicate in the horse’s language.

Critics of our education system worry that we’re producing test-takers instead of creative thinkers. I worry about the same thing in the training world. We want to recite the right technique so the horse will perform the right task. We grade each effort as pass or fail. Horses look like robots and at the same time, we hope for beauty and finesse. We’re crazy-making.

Worst of all, when we use canned techniques without understanding who horses are and how they think, it’s the equivalent of an angry adult demanding compliance, “because I said so,” with the end result more important than the methods used. Instead, we should be engaging the horse’s curiosity and rewarding the try, beginning a path of learning that neither side ever wants to end.

Training techniques do have a place. Consider them the cheerful classroom where we meet, the studio where the art is created. Techniques are the starting place, not the be-all, because training should be less about blind obedience and more about understanding and perception from both teacher and student. One size never fits all but that’s the best part. It means we constantly add to our well of understanding of horses, that they will be endlessly fascinating in their individuality, and training will never be an answer by rote for us, either.

The topic of creativity is missing in everything I read about horse training, except for the words of classical riding masters who frequently said riding was an art.  They didn’t mean it as a figure of speech. It was literal.

Are you intimidated to call yourself an artist? Does the word come with baggage and expectation? Would you need to wear black? I had a long art career and I credit my success to growing up on a farm. It’s about getting by on wits and some twine, working with materials on hand. It’s thinking things through before rushing ahead, and knowing that sometimes trying an alternate route is better. It’s having a goal that’s hidden from view, and thinking it’ll be fun finding it. Instead of yelling, “Where is North Dakota?” louder, it’s starting the conversation by saying, “Want to go somewhere?”

How important is creativity? It’s how fear turns into curiosity. It’s how brains win over brawn. It’s the action of being in the moment with a horse and letting go of the need to control how the conversation unfolds. Creativity is changing perspective and experimenting, letting natural anticipation work in your favor.  It’s discovering a way to only say yes to a horse, and still get the result you want.

Creativity is how a human becomes more interesting than grass.

…

Anna Blake at Infinity Farm

Join us at The Barn, our online training group at annablake.com

Email ambfarm@gmail.com for clinic hosting details or to be added to the email list.

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Photo & Poem: Lead Me

 

The horse’s eye curtained by his forelock,

his ear turns to stare back as we walk

in matched strides, left hoof and left

foot lift ahead, our weights land and

shift to the right, part of us on solid

ground, part swinging just above. Don’t

think; take no notice that will alter the

rhythm or restrict what would be free.

Let flow, this ease of movement, our

elders were nomads. Joined like sky and

earth, my hip to his shoulder, his hooves

choosing steps not longer than mine.

 

…

Anna Blake at Infinity Farm

Join us at The Barn, our online training group at annablake.com

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Learning to Let Go: Pearl

Click to view slideshow.

She arrived at Infinity Farm unceremoniously. We moved a fence panel, backed the rig in close, and she pretty much fell out the back of the trailer. That was good news; they weren’t sure she’d survive the trip.

It isn’t my intention to cue a circle of hand wringing, sympathy is not the goal. If we write heroic stories about champions and lifetime partners, then rescues deserve to have their story told, too.

I’m on the board of a local rescue. We’d picked her up at an auction, malnourished with last winter’s hair matted over her skeleton, and a spine that had both a curve and an arch. The vet thought she was young, perhaps an injured rope donkey. Just guesses, really. She wasn’t doing well at the busy intake barn, so I got the call; I keep the Grandfather Horse’s spot ready for an un-adoptable someone.

She had elegant ears but flat unmoving eyes. She started eating but she drank way too much water. She slowly gained weight but took several long naps a day. She arrived without a name, but she became our Pearl, the living definition of bittersweet.

Pearl hadn’t been haltered and was people-shy, probably with very good reason. But as soon as she had some strength, she was interested in the herd. First, we tried Arthur, the goat, but when he touched the top of his horn-less skull to her shoulder, Pearl tumbled to the ground. Edgar Rice Burro was the obvious choice. It’s been his job to welcome newcomers here for the last decade, putting fear to rest in the most frightened hearts, but he ate all her hay. We gave her run of the yard by the barn with the best grass, but she ended up chasing my barn manager around the tree. She eye-balled Roo, Nickole’s refugee from a therapeutic program, but he pinned his ears, still too grumpy and aggressive after almost two years here.

While in New Zealand at Equidays, Nickole messaged me that Pearl was in trouble. On an icy-cold morning, she’d found Pearl on the ground, disoriented and too weak to stand. Nickole got her up to her wobbly feet and hours later, the vet arrived for a scheduled horse appointment. The vet felt Pearl was too frail for testing, but guessed Equine Motor Neuron Disease. Unsurprisingly, it’s both debilitating and terminal. I asked Nickole to not let her suffer, if it came to that, and I started home.

This is where Cupid comes in. I was feeling sorry for myself at the L.A. airport, sipping wine and voting. The board of directors of the rescue were making some hard decisions. It was late October and we had too many elders. That’s a bad combination for a horse who’s done nothing wrong but get old and crippled, then dumped at an auction. It still gets to me; some of the photos of elders we were making decisions about had Christmas bows from last year’s attempt to find them homes. I messaged them we’d have a stall soon and he came to Infinity Farm.

Pearl had a come-back. Cupid hated everybody, especially the goat. Roo continued to attack anyone if there was a blade of hay around. The anxiety worried Edgar and Bhim, the mini… don’t even ask. My “deplorable pen” was full but at least the price of hay was going up. Bittersweet.

Around this time, Pearl started chasing Bhim, not that she had the strength or agility to do it. He baited her on, and it usually ended with her falling on top of him. Pearl continued sleeping too much, but she convinced Cupid to join her. His knees are both double-sized with arthritis, having the courage to lay down with her was a balm. Now the two of them slept for hours, snoring away. After lunch, Pearl would latch onto Edgar Rice Burro’s backside and he’d tow her around the pen until he was tired. Then everyone had another nap. Eventually Roo was drawn in. The first time we saw him playing with Pearl, then wrestling with Bhim, we thought we were hallucinating.

Pearl stayed in a “veal pen” at night, a run by herself next to Cupid, with too much hay and a couple of servings of my miracle mash. Turned out in the morning, she’d gallop, using her hind legs as one, careening into her friends. By now, she knew we had fingers and when she needed an ear scratch, she’d come at a dead run diagonally, either hitting a fence a few feet away or slamming into us dead center. She had no steering but had gained enough weight to be dangerous. We loved that she felt the thrill of running and playing, tormenting the goat, chewing hunks of hair out of Edgar. We couldn’t take our eyes away. Bittersweet.

She crashed into fences, gate posts, and the side of the barn, hitting hard. Sometimes she’d take a slow step back and her hind would give out and she’d flip over on her back, hitting her head, frozen and dazed. Sometimes, struggling to stand, she’d stagger, flinging herself in all directions until she got hung up in a fence, and had to be rescued. We couldn’t take our eyes away. Bittersweet.

No, Pearl is not a common rescue, adoption was never a possibility, but Roo and Cupid are too normal. They don’t require a miraculous human effort; the more I’ve done this over the years, the more certain I am that we do not heal them. They don’t need special handling, training of any kind, or a fortune in supplements. They need herd life. They need a safe place to live out their days with other horses and donkeys. It takes no special skill; you throw hay and muck. One day a cloudy-eyed, decrepit Appaloosa stands behind you, almost unnoticed. As you turn, you see his eye softer, and not that he’d ever ask for it, you have the privilege of thanking him.

Please, no lamenting for Pearl. Reliving the horrors of abuse leaves a mark on us, energetically. Repeating horror stories only adds to our collective negativity and I’ve never met an equine that benefited from commiseration. They don’t need our thoughts and prayers, or our rage and disgust. They just need a little time at your farm. The herd will do the rest.

Learning to let go of the darkness inside of us is the hardest and best lesson for any of us- elder horses, wayward goats, long-ear misanthropes, or the “gray mare” that cares for them. My friend Elaine says, “I guess when she was fulfilled, she could leave the party.” And it would have been very selfish of us to ask her to stay longer.

We said good-bye on Valentine’s Day. When I was younger, it was a hard day most years. I would long for the relationship I wasn’t having, the hearts I had not stolen. Standing with Pearl waiting for the vet, surrounded by gang of reprobates, each one of us was changed by her cantankerous visit… Letting go never felt better.

…

Anna Blake at Infinity Farm

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