In Ham We Trust

We adopted Scooter from a shelter almost ten years ago. He had been captured with other feral kittens 8 months earlier. As with many ferals, he was sick, but many hands helped him thrive. Unfortunately, there was not much time for socializing young cats, so he is extremely timid.

Life with Scooter is on HIS terms. He chooses when and where to be stroked. He loves long discussions and shares his opinions. He will head bump and accept us into his personal pride, and then roll around asking for attention. He comes when called (most of the time) but one wrong move (and we are never quite sure what that will be) and he scoots under the bed, which is how he got his name. Do not even think about picking him up. I thought he might get better over time. Forget it. Okay. Fine. But we knew if he got sick, we would not be able to administer medication. He would be on his own. For ten years, we have kept our fingers crossed.


But now, it’s finally happened. He started sneezing last week, first one little snort, then another and another until he was sneezing like a chugging train. There was NO WAY we were going to get him into a crate to bring him to the vet; however, she told us it would be fine to administer the still current antibiotic in the refrigerator, left over from Willow’s regime last summer. The question was: How do we get hold of him to get it down his throat, not once, but once a day for the next FIVE DAYS?


While making lunch the other day; however, a light bulb went on. The cats were swirling around my feet, waiting for a tidbit to drop. I unwrapped some sliced ham to make a sandwich and glanced down at Scooter’s eager face. More than anything else on the planet, Scooter adores ham. And since cold cuts are SO not the thing to give your cats, he almost never gets any. But I thought: Oh, Scooter, I am totally going to take advantage of your passion.


I grabbed the antibiotic, drew up a dose into the syringe and wrapped a tiny piece of ham around the tip to mask the smell, then knelt on the floor and started handing out little pieces of ham to all the cats, using their competition to bring Scooter closer to me. Here’s a piece for you, another one for you; here’s another…there you go, have another. Come closer, Scooter...a little closer....


He glided alongside my hip for the chunk of meat in front of me. I swooped him into my arms right there on the floor and placed his body against mine so he couldn’t back up. Holding his head in both hands, I gently pried his mouth open and squirted the medicine in. YAY! Then released him while simultaneously offering him another piece of ham, which he grabbed and jumped back a step. He eyeballed me, as in “What the heck happened there?” But the other cats distracted him and he got right back into the ham fray.


I have used the same technique two more times. Scooter is getting better. In the meantime, I need to go out and buy a few more slices of ham. Maybe this will work on my husband.

Scooter dozing with Sparkle.

Happy Thanksgiving 2009

Wow—another year of gratitude to add on to last year’s list!

I am grateful that I am still around, as are my husband, Mom & Dad, three sisters and brother, my sisters' children, their spouses, children and the evolving relationships I cherish with each of them. I am grateful G is home from service in the Marines, and trust he will win his personal wars with the help of his German Shepherd, Major, at his side like the good brother he is. My home, my cats, food three times a day (or more), my town, the Farmer’s Market in summer, two cars that still run, clothes on my back, hair on my head, my family of friends in various stages of coming and going.

Health, laughter, books, insight, notebooks, shoes, shampoo, kind co-workers, dark chocolate, just enough money, watches, soft socks, smooth-writing pens, hospital emergency rooms, brakes, air conditioning in the summer, heat in the winter. Potential. Hope.
 An Ipod with over 5000 songs with room for more, buttercream, cell phones, the sharp scent of ozone before a storm, geese calling from their “V,” friends who tell you the truth.


Electricity, otters, automatic coffee pots, lace tablecloths, airplanes, rain, Xanax, trees, raccoons, bears and flying squirrels. Coming home at the end of the day, newspapers in my driveway, pancakes with real Vermont fancy maple syrup.
 Catherine, morning skies, moonlight stroking my sleeping husband, heated birdbaths, warblers, intuition, prayer, shoes to walk miles in. Telephones. Dirt. Birdseed. Blue Jays picking peanuts off the deck railing, deck chairs, music, the warm clove aroma of mulled wine.


Earthworms, quiet afternoons, scented candles, hard boiled eggs, no-kill animal shelters and the people who work in them, pizza with extra cheese, solitude, naps, friends who understand pain, birds, the Grand Canyon, wild horses, bubble baths, sparkly rings, blank pages, poetry, Mary Oliver. Dishwashers, growing up a girl, roses, periwinkle. A 30 year friendship lost and now found.


Kind veterinarians, walks in the woods, recipes, corduroy, fingernails, medicine, cat food, chants, indoor plumbing, Willie Nelson, clothes dryers, cross stitch patterns, green, restaurant dinners, lemons, hummingbirds, Elk lake, blogs.
 Loons.


Water, duct tape, wireless routers, flush toilets, soap, icicles, forsythia. Swingline staplers, batteries, fingers, calendars, keyboards, love, switches, picture frames, flashlights, bookends, E. B. White. Answering machines, gas stations, orange juice, chocolate chips, apricots. Angels. Stories with happy endings, Belize, Dr. Cappitelli, flour, antivirus software, highlighters, harmony. Calligraphy, combs, toothpaste, wild bunnies in the back yard. The back yard. Wolves.


Pencils, bees, pansies, polka dots, pillows, zebras, salad, well-behaved children, convertibles, magazines. Sleeping kittens, fireflies, peanut butter, good clergy, email, drumming woodpeckers in March, red, American flags, dragons, acorns, light bulbs, soap, jewelry boxes, ponies, walking sticks, Elizabeth, dragonflies, guitars, tomorrow, cat litter, mirrors, blueberries, blinking Christmas reindeer, sequins, dictionaries, windy days, fleece blankets, wet tree bark, Fridays.


Purple, unicorns, rakes, beginnings, grace, bats, stars, computers, bookends, hosta, garbage cans, skin, new tires, sunglasses, computer glasses, binoculars, birding scope, Baltimore Orioles, birding days, screech owl nights, duplicate car keys, paved roads, caller ID, friends who don’t let you go.


The list never ends. AMEN.

Mark Rashid and Life Lessons

Having heard of Mark Rashid from other horse bloggers, 7MSNRanch, Grey Horse Matters and Teachings of the Horse, I was excited to attend one of his workshops during the Equine Affaire last weekend. Mark is a gifted teacher and can identify a problem a horse and rider may be having while holding up the higher lesson for everyone. You don’t need to be a horse owner to leave his clinics a little wiser, with real tools to connect you to what is important in life.

He started off by asking the rider: “Tell me about your horse.”
We learned this lovely gray gelding had been a camp horse. Which translates as: The horse had been ridden by scores of people who didn’t have a clue how to ride and probably had yanked its mouth yanked, sides kicked and who knows what else. (This is not to say all camp horses are abused but when any animal, including humans, are subjected to those who are learning how to behave around something or someone new, there will be mistakes). Behaviors learned to avoid pain become habits, even when the original reason for them are gone. While buying a horse with this kind of history may be economical, you will also be buying the animal’s experience of every rider who has ever thrown a leg over its back).
The rider explained to Mark that her horse flipped its head up and down when she asked him to do anything, making it feel like a disconnected steering wheel. Mark asked her to move the horse and sure enough, the horse bobbed away; up and down, up and down.
“Stand still,” Mark directed. The rider stopped while the horse continued to bob its head. Mark walked over, gathered the shallow loop in the reins and stood still. The horse’s head stopped bobbing.
It looked like Mark was doing nothing, but within minutes, the horse dropped its head into position and was still. We could see the muscles in his great body relax.
After some discussion, Mark asked the rider to walk on and then pick up a trot. The horse bobbed again. Mark zeroed in:

“How many folks here have heard the term, ‘Follow with your hands?’” Which means as the horse moves, your hands on the reins follow what seems to be a forward and back motion so (supposedly) you don’t interfere with the horse’s movement. But imagine you are the horse with a bit in your mouth. It moves forward and back in your mouth, banging it; ouch, how annoying. Don’t you want the bit to be still and steady so you can figure out how to move the rest of your body with it? In effect, in trying to communicate, the rider was actually dropping the horse’s head, which encouraged the habit of avoiding being banged in the mouth that led to the bobbing in the first place.
Under Mark’s tutelage, the rider’s arms relaxed and her hands on the reins became still and steady. As they walked and trotted around the arena, the horse’s neck began to arch as his head dropped to the bit and stayed there. His stride became fluid and relaxed as he engaged his newly balanced body. There were a few head flips here and there, but we could see the rider understood that the horse had been wanting to do the right thing all along. Now she understood how to ask.

“It will take some practice,” Mark advised. “Take the time to do that. You’ll get it.”
I turned and looked outside, letting this sink in while fingering my imaginary reins. There is something here for me too. Perhaps I can learn to ride through the challenges of each day without following my stresses and worries back and forth and banging myself in the mouth with them. Maybe all I need to do is hold my reins still and allow the Universe to relax and unfold as my life surges forward. It doesn’t have to be so hard. It will just take some practice. But now I understand how to ask.

My Own Equine Affaire

It was fitting that an abandoned friendship was reignited in the place it began over 30 year ago: In a barn. Not any old barn either but The Equine Affaire in Springfield, MA. We had two and a half days of laughter and sharing and shopping, along with plans for more in the future.
Even though I not currently involved with horses, it is still an inner hunger that nothing else satisfies. Horses are not just horses to me, just as birds are not just birds, but symbols that must have been incorporated into my soul and psyche at birth. They are my spirit guides personified; to be near them is to dance with the Universe. To be part of the larger community, even at a distance, activates a different kind of faith. My friend, who like me is also no longer involved with horses, has never lost the fire in her soul either.

I know the practical side of the equnie world with the aches, agonies, broken bones and broken hearts would seem to have little to do with lofty ideas of spirituality. Watching an eagle soar may be an uplifting and patriotic image until you remember they feed on carrion. What I am talking about is the need for symbols--tangible things that point to something greater than themselves. To be among them, with kindness and without judgment is to breath in the Great Lessons. It is to be reminded of our own bodies as creatures, evolving according to our own biology and frail understanding, and not by schedules or calendars or executive positioning.

That said, let us move on to some photos:

I was impressed with how friendly the exhibitors were, unheard of in the tense atmosphere of competitive horse shows, which this was NOT. We were encouraged to stroll the barn aisles at will and were even offered photo ops:

This is a 7 year-old Friesian stallion. I am smitten.

Here he is again:

Meet Isaac, a 20-hand Shire (80 inches tall from floor to wither)
Look what I found in the parking lot.

We attended the Friday night performance of Fantasia, a musical event showcasing different breeds and their abilities. I also think it is an opportunity for people who normally show their horses in the tension of show politics to have fun and strut the horses' stuff their way.

Here are the Canadian cowgirls, an annual favorite of the crowd.

Here is my boy again, in costume!
There was even a chariot race!

After the show, the riders returned to chat up the crowd and sign autographs. I have never experienced this in any formal event involving horses--I am still amazed!
Yes, folks...this is Pam Goodrich and Donnerhit, whose performance brought me to tears.

I see you too!

I plan to do this again next November...in the meantime, my friend and I are contemplating going to Horse Camp....

The Best Things in Life

Sometimes the best things in life come together at the same time.
The reuniting of old friends....
Who share a common bond.
More later....

Brandenburg Gate

When the news came on tonight, I watched the dominoes tumble before the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, listened to the speeches and wondered about a city once divided by a concrete and barbed wire wall. So many died trying to scale it or fly over it and now all you have to do is walk by and nobody cares.

I remember walking through the guards and the guns from West Berlin to East Berlin and then back again. It was called Checkpoint Charlie. I was an exchange student, living with a family in Austria in 1969-70 when World War II was still very much a fabric of the community where I lived for one year.

One of these days, I will write about it.

Frost Diamonds

It was cold last night. This morning, I looked out at the deck to see the frost diamonds but sadly, the flowers that had braved the storms of summer and cool September evenings finally succumbed to the hard hand of approaching winter.
The water in the bird bath was frozen solid, entombing the leaves that had given it shade all summer.
By the time we got out of bed, the sun was already hard at work erasing the evidence but the limp fronds of the bonfire begonias told the tale of cold gone too far this time.
This is before....
This is after....
Persian Shield before....
Persian Shield after....
Today, we will finish our winter preparations. Roll up the hose from the back yard, clean out the shed to make room for the emptied flowers pots, maneuver the lawn mower to the rear and give center stage to the snow blower. Clean the bird feeders too, though we cannot hang them yet until the bears are down, which will be another month or so depending upon the weather. We are another day closer to swirling snow and hot chocolate, icy winds and down comforters. I am almost relieved the holidays are almost here to distract us from the long nights ahead.

Halloween is over. November is upon us. We can smell a frost coming tonight. The plants have been dragged indoors, the hatches are closed, chicken soup is in the freezer, flannel sheets are tucked on the bed. This is the waiting time.