When I was nine, our next door neighbor, a high school girl, was hired by my parents to teach me to ride a horse. She rode a beautiful quarter horse named Chips, and I got the pony, Pickles. Pickles was like the Asgardian Loki, an inveterate trickster. He specialized in things like stepping on my foot while I was learning to put on his saddle, things that embarassed me to no end.
One day I was tasked to leave Chips’ side and walk along two sides of the field behind our house, then trot diaganolly back. All was going well until we hit the diagonal return. Pickles galloped all-out, then nearing our driveway, stopped on all four hooves (think cartoon-style) whereupon I catapulted over his head and into a sandbox. He then proceeded back to his home down our 1.4 mile driveway and interrupted a dinner party. Seeing Pickles alone meant that he threw someone, again, so the entire party made their way up our drive to make sure I was OK. I haven’t been on a horse since that day.
So now, for over fifty years, I’ve had a healthy respect for, and fear of, horses. But at age 30 I was gifted a five week-old kitten and I knew nothing of cats but learned quickly. So the other day, we brought my in-laws’ new dog (dumped near their ranch a couple of months ago) to a major city to be spayed. It was an overnight trip and we had dinner with the vet who would be doing the surgery, my husband’s cousin. We trust her implicitly as she took out the hips of our first dog over 20 years ago when she was diagnosed as a pup with the worst hip dysplasia any vet had ever seen. A few months later, after growing her own hips from cartilage, our “new” pup was cornering around trees and beating Golden Retrievers to the tennis ball!
We had a couple of hours to kill before dinner so got a tour of their property, which includes a number of dogs and cats, a rare lizard, at least one snake, horses and one donkey. Oh, and a rescued American Alligator. In their pond. OK’d by Fish and Game, for now. A third-generation horse with one eye was the first to come up to say hello and I must say I didn’t feel any fear. I petted her and we got along great. She even nuzzled my hair. It was quite the pleasant, if messy, experience! I know that one is not supposed to show fear to any companion animal as their senses are very attuned to it, and I passed the test! About time, Dee. Horses are such magnificent animals that to never touch one again in my lifetime would be a shame.
It’s now 48 hours after spay surgery and the patient is out and about, still not eating and sluggish from all the drugs but definitely on the mend. Which fits into another story. Since my in-laws moved here (the big city metroplex flooded the home they built decades ago for a reservoir) they’ve had a few unusual guests. There’s a prison in town and they tend to let their paroled inmates go just before suppertime, with just a plastic grocery bag of their belongings, nothing in their stomachs and no phone call to friend or family. A few miles from the jail, this is the first house they see to the south, so they knock on the door and ask for a ride to the nearest town 15 miles away, or to use the phone to call a ride.
The in-laws were out of town yesterday and my husband was locked away on a zoom call. Our princess of a non-guard dog Lulu was barking indoors and the stray rescue was in solitary recuperating outside and there came a knock at the front door. He was very polite. I had bread in the oven and dinner in prep stage and declined to drive him to the next town as my f-i-l had done “last time.” But after locking the door I got my phone and let him call his sister for a ride.
Later, when the folks were home for dinner I told my f-i-l that his prison buddy had returned for another ride. They joked that my principal job now on the ranch is to get any strays spayed or neutered. So, parolees, if you want a ride, phone call or free meal, Dee will have to make sure you’re neutered first! Hey, it worked for me when I was single and not interested in a particular suitor. What are your hobbies, Dee? “I help spay and neuter feral cats on weekends.” His hands instinctively cover his groin. There’s another unwanted date taken care of. Phew! Glad I found my husband of nearly 22 years so I don’t have to go through that charade anymore.
Life on the farm, never a dull moment. Perhaps I’ll even get to ride a horse before we leave this burg. For now I’ve Moonshine, and memories. Cheers! Dee
Cooking with Dee 