The Best Laid Plans…….Sometimes Lead to Fate

 

(Warning!!! Graphic Equine Photos within this post!!!)

This weekend was the Santa Fe Spanish Renaissance Festival and we had hoped to go on Saturday because one of our friends was riding his Arabian Horse in Spanish costume that day. But we ended having too much during the day so we could catch up around here, so we planned to go on Saturday instead. Another of our friends was planning on riding her gorgeous Lipizzaner/Hungarian Warmblood named Zema, in full costume on Sunday, and Just Like Last Year, we couldn’t wait to see the two of them doing their Airs Above Ground.

Looks like we’ll have to wait until the Halloween ACTHA rides to see them again, because our best laid plans led us into an entirely different direction.

Normally I choose to drive up to Santa Fe via The scenic Turquoise Trail, but for some reason today I decided to take a different route, a sort of short-cut back-way that eventually connects with The Turquoise Trail further up the road, closer to Santa Fe. I’ve only driven this route a couple times and I like it because it goes right past Walkin N Circles Ranch Horse Rescue (WNCR), and sometimes I like to stop in to say hello to the horses and volunteers.

On Sunday, there wasn’t enough time to stop by, even though a voice in my head kept niggling at me telling me to stop by for a visit with Eleanor, the abandoned starved mare that was rescued by my friends at WNCR,  along with with her gelding friend, now named Franklin, earlier in the week.

Instead I drove right past. But I didn’t get far. Less than 2 miles north of WNCR, I came upon a loose horse beside the road. I drove by and mentioned I should call 911 to report it, but felt guilty about not doing more.

 

My twinling Jem, told me, “Mama, we need to turn around. You won’t be able to live with yourself if we don’t do something to help”. I knew he was right, but I really wanted to get up to Santa Fe, an hour’s drive, so we could have fun at the Ren Fair.

As I turned my vehicle around at the next pull-out, I kept thinking, “Fate has led us into an entirely different direction than what we had planned.”

We parked on the gravel driveway, but the gate was padlocked many times over. My twinlings knew we’d have to scale the gate to get to the two houses, A & B.

I looked at the loose horse edging closer to the road, and told my twinlings to go for it, but to be careful in case there loose, aggressive dogs on the property.

Looks like we were now trespassers on private property.

 

But I was just hoping that if the homeowners were home, and owned guns, that they asked questions first, before shooting.

(The DK initials on the gate made me think of the phrase, “Don’t Know where your horse is”)

Unfortunately no one was home at either house, and we had to move forward to Plan B, which we really didn’t have, but I can be pretty good at wingin’ it.

I called 911 on my cell phone and asked to be hooked up with Animal Control. I gave them our location and told them about the situation, and they told me they’d have an Officer contact me soon.

Well I waited about 20 minutes and no one called. During our wait, we kept ourselves between the road and the horse, to keep the drivers safe, as well as the horse.

Finally I got tired of waiting and called 911 again, and they seemed surprised that I hadn’t been contacted by Animal Control yet. They told me they’d check into it and have the officer call me asap. So I waited another 10 minutes and then decided to call my friend and mentor Colleen, who is the Ranch Manager and founding Mother of WNCR. She was down at Cedar Hill Farm, enjoying some time off with family, so she recommended I get more demanding with Animal Control, so I called them again and explained how serious this situation could turn out to be.

A couple minutes later the Animal Control Officer, Paul, called me on my cell phone and explained there wasn’t much he could do since they didn’t have a horse trailer available. I found out later that the trailer was being worked on.

At this point the horse seemed to change somehow. She wasn’t focused on grazing on the grass that she had jumped over the fence to reach. She just walked, slowly, aimlessly closer to the road. She appeared to be a sort of shock.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have a spare halter or lead rope in my vehicle, but I did have a lariat.

(My twinling Jem was ready to try it out)

Me, not so much. I’ve never roped anything alive before in my life. Thankfully we didn’t have to use it as this mare was a good girl and easily moved off our energy.

We moved her closer to the fence so she could be near her 3 pasture buddies, and further from the road.

 

And as my twinling Jem came around to the front of her, because until this time, she had only showed us her left side, he gasped and said, “Mama, she ripped herself wide open!”

And it was true.

Poor girl. And I could see it in her eyes that the pain had caught up with her.

She was also favoring that leg and limping. But she was very sweet and calm and I stood beside her and stroked her and told her it would be ok very soon.

The situation had went from serious to emergency status, so I called Colleen again and she didn’t answer her phone, so I felt a message and explained how this mare had torn her chest open with an 8 inch by 4 inch gash. My memories of dear sweet handsome Rojo's last night came flooding back.

That must have been fate, too. And just like that time,  I was alone, except for my great kidlets, with an injured horse who needed me to help her. Fate had chosen me to be there and I did what I had to do.

Animal Control wasn’t able to help that time with Rojo, either. Only a high-powered rifle held by a Sheriff’s Officer carried Rojo away from his pain forever.

But this time was different. The injury wasn’t life threatening and this time I wasn’t alone. I had my kidlets, and I had a great network of support.

Colleen called me back and let me know that she had another volunteer, my friend Loeta (the gal who rode Bella in front of Apache and I then Rosie and I, during our Carson National Forest Horse Camping trip in July) coming with the WNCR horse trailer to load this mare and take her back to WNCR.

I was so grateful because we had already been standing out there for over an hour, and while lots of cars drove past and saw us standing there with this loose horse, no one stopped to see if they could help.

Ironically, the Sheriff stopped by just about 15 minutes before Loeta and the horse trailer arrived. It was nice to see him there and he was helpful in that he was willing to go leave a note and Sheriff’s card on the homeowner’s doors, so they would know to contact WNCR after they got home and realized they were missing a horse. I can only imagine how horrible and worried they will feel.

(Jen was doing a wonderful job comforting this mare, even bringing her handfuls of grass so the mare might keep her mind off the pain and wouldn’t have to walk.)

My twinling Jem offered to climb over the fence and show the Officer the houses, so that is what they did while Jax, Jen and I waited for Loeta to arrive. I was so relieved to see her and the horse trailer and know that there would now be help for this beautiful sweet mare.

The mare loaded up as if she knew we were there to help. She had a little trouble because of the stiffness and pain from her chest muscles, but she loaded easily on the first try. We were grateful for the mare’s responsible owners who did such a good job at trailer training her for an emergency such as this.

At this point we’d already been out there for close to two hours, so even though we could have just headed up to Santa Fe, we decided to follow Loeta back down to WNCR and wait with her for the Vet to arrive, so they could treat the mare.

(That’s Jenna on the left and Loeta on the right)

Another wonderful ranch hand volunteer, named Jenna, was there working and offered to help us clean up this mare’s wound and get her set up in a stall.

 

 

After her wound was washed out, I took the opportunity to visit with the starved, abandoned mare that I posted about last week. As one of the volunteers on the PR and Advertising Team, Loeta had asked me to contact the TV stations and Newspapers to do a story on this mare and her gelding friend.

WNCR wants to get the story out to everyone that they should never just abandon their horses to fend for themselves, even if they can’t afford to care for their horses anymore. They want folks to know that there are other options.

So, I left the injured mare with Loeta, and went to visit with and take some photos of the starved, abandoned mare.

I was finally going to meet in person the same starved, abandoned mare, that I had such a strong urge to visit on Sunday as we drove past, while ignoring that urge……which eventually led me to fate.

And there I was in her stall with my hands stroking her frail thin body……right back to where I was supposed to be.

Eleanor is very loving and would become very relaxed when I would let her rest her head against me. She also seemed to enjoy me holding her head in my arms, as if her head is just too heavy to carry around. She also enjoyed having my daughter Jen pet and stroke her softly, too.

(Excuse the fuzzy photo. The poor lighting and dust in the barn don’t bode well for photography)

(Look past the skin and bones……isn’t she absolutely gorgeous? My heart aches and I want to cry every time I look at her or the photos I took. I’m in love with this beautiful, gentle girl.)

And about an hour and half later, I finally left this loving, skinny mare’s side at about the same time that the Vet arrived to treat the injured mare, and wonderful Colleen drove up from Cedar Hill Farm to see how she could help. There are a lot of very special people at Walkin N Circles Horse Rescue and I'm proud to be a part of such a special team of volunteers.

(This post is already too long. I’ll post more about Eleanor, the starved abandoned mare in my next post. Thanks for reading this one and sharing in my experience)