To start with, this little story isn’t really about ancient history
since it just happened a couple of months ago.
It really is not my story; I’m just the one who gets to tell it. There has been quite a bit of local interest
in this story and folks thought it should be shared with the readers of
this blog. This little tale
includes my wife, Carolyn, and our neighbor and a few other people, but in the
end, it really is the story of a horse.
The horse
belonged to our neighbor. It is a
seven-year old mare, a beautiful Paint.
It is broken to ride, has an interesting personality and loves to romp
and run in the pastures along Highway 82, across the road from Bear Creek, just
east of La Farge. The horse’s name is
Holly. Holly used to be with two other
horses in the pasture looking out over the creek, but by last winter, she was
alone. That is not a good thing for a
horse as they are social animals and like to be with other horses.
Carolyn started to help take care of Holly the horse due to the
declining health of our neighbor. Last
winter, Carolyn arranged for a supply of hay to be brought in for Holly and she
fed the horse grain and watered it through that cold season. Carolyn has had an affinity for horses every
since she had a horse as a girl growing up on a farm on Camp Creek east of
Viola. She likes being around horses and
has a way with them. She’s not quite a
“Horse Whisperer”, but Carolyn has been able to handle some mighty skittish
horses that others can’t.
(I, on the other hand, am generally terrified
of the critters. That terror may stem
from my last time on a horse over forty years ago, when while riding sideways
in the saddle and perpendicular to the ground (which is really a bad position
to be in), that horse misinterpreted my “WHOA” for “GO” and tried to peel me
off on the nearest gate post at a high rate of speed. Alcohol may have been a factor in that
episode, but tragedy was averted and my Roy Rogers days were over.)
Just to the
east of Holly’s little pasture and across the driveway, four other horses are
on pasture. Being alone, Holly yearned
to be with the other horses. During this
past summer, she started getting out of her pen on a regular basis to go over
and see the other horses. Holly would
stand at the pasture fence and some of the other horses would come over to
visit. They would talk horse talk,
nuzzle each other and just hang out together like horses do. Unfortunately, sometimes Holly wandered out
onto the highway, which became a problem.
Eventually at the end of September, she was moved over to our pasture
east of the house, which had more secure fences. It was a move that was not popular with
Holly. She was further away from the
other horses and would pace along the fence and gaze longingly at her erstwhile
horse pals.
As time went on, our neighbor’s health
continued to be an issue and it was decided that Holly should have another
home. So her owner and Carolyn started
to look for a buyer.
Many people
driving by on the nearby highway had admired the Paint horse in our pasture and
when the word got out that the horse was for sale, people started calling and
dropping in to make an offer. In
mid-October, Carolyn made some calls and a family stopped by to look Holly
over. They walked her around and even
got her to cross the drainage ditch in the lower end of the pasture that nobody
else could get her to cross. They talked with Holly’s owner and a deal was made
for them to purchase Holly for their teenage girl to ride. No money changed hands, but the family
assured Holly’s owner that they would be back in a week or so with a check and to
pick up the horse.
In the
meantime, Carolyn continued to care for Holly.
She supplemented the sparse pasture grass of the fall season with horse
treats for Holly – 12% Sweet Feed, which the horse came to relish on a daily
basis. As October turned to November and
then December, Carolyn brought over hay from the neighbors to feed her
horse. Eventually after weeks of
waiting, the family who had intended to buy Holly had to back out of the deal. This was on December 5th. Carolyn and our neighbor had a couple of
back-up buyers, but all of those potential buyers fell through as well.
Winter was coming fast and Carolyn seemed
to have a horse to care for if it could not be sold. She made many more calls and finally a lady
from La Farge bought Holly. This was on
December 15th. Money changed
hands and on December 22nd, Holly was walked into town and over to a
pasture on the north side of La Farge located in old Seelyburg. There, Holly had the companionship of two
other horses and come the spring season, another teenage girl would be riding
her.
It snowed most of the day here in
the Kickapoo Valley on Sunday, December 23rd. It was after eight o’clock that night when
there was a knock on our front door. A
pickup was parked in the driveway and when I answered the door, the man said,
“Your horses are out”. I said, “I don’t
have any horses”. Another man standing
in the driveway said, “We were driving out from town following these two horses
up the highway and they turned into your driveway”.
Thinking they were two of the four
horses on pasture to the east, I told the guys they belonged at the next place
down the road. The men said OK and
started back down the snowy driveway.
Down by the barn, we could see two horses running around in the dark,
but they soon got in behind the pickup and headed out to the highway and over
to the neighbor’s place.
Carolyn got on the phone to contact
the people who rented the pasture and owned the other horses. Soon after, our neighbor called to say that
Holly had returned and had brought a friend with her! It was a Christmas miracle or perhaps a
Christmas headache or maybe something in between! By this time the owner of the other horses,
who were in their pasture, came and put Holly and friend into our pasture. Carolyn called the lady who owned the horses
– the second one was a buckskin gelding that went by the name of Buck – and she
went up to Seelyburg to check on her third horse. She found the hole in the fence where Holly
and Buck made their escape, fixed the fence and then followed their trail in the
snow down Mill Street. The horses had
checked out the sheds at Nuzum’s but found nothing open, so then headed up La
Farge’s Main Street and followed Highway 82 out to our place on Bear
Creek. The next morning Holly was at the
pasture fence, noodling with Carolyn for some of that 12% Sweet Feed. Buck the tagalong gelding, a true annoyance
to Holly by this time, lined up at the food trough as well.
The horses spent the week of
Christmas at our place. Carolyn had to
make another hay run to keep the two horses fed properly. On December 27th, Holly and a very
reluctant Buck made the walk back into La Farge and over to their digs at
Seelyburg, where, I am happy to say, they still reside.
I drive by that Seelyburg pasture
occasionally to make sure that Holly is staying put. My pickup putts a little loud due to a needed
muffler and I think Holly might recognize the truck. There is still a bale of hay in the back of
the pickup and as I drove away, it seemed that Holly the horse was paying
serious attention to my departure route.
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