March 27

Last Friday Tanya, our vet, came out to give the horses their spring shots – rabies, west Nile virus, etc. Zippy received a few extra shots for diseases that I can’t begin to pronounce. On Saturday Zips will be going to the barn where Kath takes riding lessons and he will stay there for the month of April to get exercised and retrained for some serious riding. Zip is a former dressage champion, retired. And he’s had it good here, eating grass. Pretty much the only stress he has here is Patrick coming up behind him to nip him on his butt.

We bought the trailer so that Kath could take Patrick to the barn for lessons, but that didn’t work out too well. Patrick didn’t mind, but he isn’t very athletic and has some kind of gait that the trainers didn’t want to work with. They pretty much said he’s a great trail horse, but his body was never meant for ballet. One of those “I like you, but lets just  be friends…” deal. So they asked what else we had….

Lou only walks, unless he smells a peppermint, or if Patrick nips him in the butt – then he will run. But we pretty much figured that the trainers weren’t going to offer him peppermints and I couldn’t quite picture Sophia or Illona sneaking up behind him and biting him in the butt to get him to move…trainers aren’t born with too much of a sense of humor. Lou wasn’t gonna work, so it was no use to even contemplate it.

So that left Zips. And so poor ol Zips got marched into that new trailer that was meant for Patrick and sped off to the barn for a trial.  ‘Ol Zips did all the right moves and had the right gait or whatever…things that trainers know about but something I may never understand. Dumb ‘ol Zips – had he been smart enough and trotted out of whack and not responded to Sophie’s heel, he’d been home free and left to enjoy grass and retirement and hang out with me in the back field. Just like Patrick and Lou. But no, not Zip! he decided to show off. The dummy.

So this Saturday he will be loaded into the trailer for an extended stay. He will get good care. During the week he will get exercised and put in shape. He will get re trained to get his responses sharpened up. Kath will go over every Saturday to take lessons on him. He’ll be fine.

But I will miss him. Sorta like sending your kids off to college – ya know it’s a good thing, and the right thing, but it still leaves that bit of emptiness that never gets totally refilled….

The problem with me and animals is that I get way too attached. Way too attached.