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Winter Priorities [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-03-05
February 5th, 6 PM, nearly dark, the fading sun irrelevant through the steady freezing rain, the pasture gate already coated with ice. Eight horses to halter and bring in, the gateway a frictionless surface, a slippery hole pockmarked with hoof prints in the waterlogged clay. Dangerous in daylight, tons of fun in the dark.
The mares are getting bitchy with each other, competing to come in first. There’s an established pecking order, but rash decisions are made on nights like this.
I’ve got two leads, calculating the benefit of fewer trips outweighs the increased risk of taking two mares at a time. I hope I’m right; if somebody knocks me down it’s even money whether I drown in a puddle or suffocate in the mud first.
I root through the pile of halters on the ground, annoyed again that so many have faded to an anonymous pinkish. Any of the halters can be made to fit any of the horses, but when you’re putting them on by feel it’s easier if the tongue of the buckle slides into a well-worn hole, rather than be jammed into one stiff from disuse or plugged with mud.
My canvas coat is several shades darker than when dry, but so far, ope, nope, my right elbow is suddenly cold and wet: a portent.
I find the halters for the alpha mare and her sidekick and snap the leads on. I’m glad the bull snap on the gate latch is broken, I don’t have to take my glove off to thaw it open. I yank the icy chain out of its ice-crusted slot and swing the gate toward me.
The alpha mare is there, black to begin with, blacker with the rain. She’s a genius at jerking her head away just as I flip the halter strap over her head, as if she suddenly hears her mother calling. Tonight she wants to come in, so she plays it straight. Good girl.
Her sidekick is nowhere in sight, still in the run-in shed hoping for a sudden drought or a transporter beam. The number three mare is oozing toward me, trying to get my attention and avoid the alpha witch’s. Screw it, I’m not turning my back on the gate to pick her halter out of the pile. I put the sidekick’s halter on and both mares come up out of the hole. I stop them and turn back to shut the gate against the wet horde.
Next trip the sidekick is there, fretting at having lost her place. I’ve brought her halter back with me so I put it on around the calisthenics of her protruding tongue. This leftover from her racing days always makes an appearance when she’s unhappy. With her is the Morgan mare who refuses to go through the gate when the electric fence is turned on. She must figure a little EMF is worth it tonight to get out of the rain; she lets me halter and lead her through without her usual theatrics.
The third pair is the two pony mares, one of whom I roundly curse for stopping to grab a bite of grass on our way in. Grass? It’s February, grass isn’t even a faint gleam in Mother Nature’s eye, but the pinto lives by the pony adage: It never hurts to try. The other pony is impatient to go, she would never try something like that. It’s a lie.
On my last trip out I notice the branches of the black walnut tree glisten with liquid silver. I unzip my pocket and slide the phone out but the camera won’t cooperate. I don’t blame it really.
The best thing about the last pair, other than the obvious, is that I don’t have to close the gate behind them. It’s the two quarter horse mares, perlino and flea-bitten gray, their pale heads and necks look disembodied poking out of their dark blankets. They just want to keep their heads down and get inside, so we do.
Everybody in and munching I stand in the barn doorway watching the ice layer getting thicker, hoping the power doesn’t go out. Several more hours of work ahead with water buckets, grain pans, and hay nets. I don’t love doing it by flashlight.
My gloves are soaked through, I’m wondering whether it’s worth trying to wring out my hat, and I think goddam, these boots are worth every nickel of the 226 dollars I spent on them.
Everything is easier with warm dry feet.
[END]
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