Four-Legged Guardian Angel

Warning: Kleenex Alert! Do NOT read this story if you are experiencing PMS or have recently lost your bottle of Zoloft!

If you were to ask my mother, I believe she would say that my first word was “horse.” If it wasn’t my first word, it was probably no less than my third. Considering that neither my mother nor father could be considered “animal people,” I believe this word may have taken my poor mother by surprise. I’m sure at the time she believed this to be a result of a popular 60’s children’s T.V. show called Mr. Ed about a talking horse, but little did she know...

Over the years, my interest for horses did not fade, but grew stronger and stronger. Every Christmas and every birthday, my first and often only request was for a horse, or if that was simply not possible, a pony. Of course as we lived in strictly suburban surroundings, an equine in the back yard was not possible, nor was it legal.

At age 6 I was finally old enough to take riding lessons at our local stables. For one hour every week, I was in heaven! I rode fat little ponies and skinny old nags, but it did not matter to me. They all had that wonderful horse smell, and if they were willing to move, I was willing to ride them.

As the years past, I found ways to keep riding, though money was sometimes tight. I worked at local barns, cleaning horses, stalls and tack in return for a lesson or two. When I was 13 years old I finally got that first pony! I spent every extra hour of every day with him, and learned all sorts of invaluable lessons, like how not to get kicked when brushing the “tickle spot” and that clean, wet ponies like to roll in the mud at the first possible chance.

At age 20 I decided to try a young, inexperienced horse. As money was tight, a critter without a lot of training was better suited for my tight budget. It was not long before a friend told me about a 2-year-old Thoroughbred who had just recently come off the race-track. He had been won in a poker bet by a truck driver named Butch who, until then, had been no closer to a horse than the picture on his “Polo” cologne. As racing and polo were the only horse related sports Butch knew of, he had the horse taken to a local polo club where he hoped the horse would earn his keep on the polo fields.

Needless to say, a young Thoroughbred with no training is about as suitable to polo as a Cadillac is to mowing lawns. The polo club demanded remuneration for the time the horse was kept on its property, and the food he was consuming. Butch could afford no such thing, so the horse was locked up with little food until the fees could be paid. At that point Butch made a call to a local slaughter house and found that the dog-food folks paid a pretty penny for healthy horses.

I got there about an hour before the slaughter house truck did. Though skinny and unkempt, there was just something about that horse that was… special. There was a certain honesty in his expression and trust in his actions that compelled me immediately. Something about his eyes spoke to my heart. I offered Butch $700 for the horse right then and there. Butch informed me that the slaughter house would pay $800 for the horse. At that time I happened to notice that Butch’s 3-year-old daughter had marched right up to the large animal, grabbed his lead rope and was taking him for a walk around the busy parking area. Butch seemed fully unaware of the danger this situation presented for his daughter, though he followed my glance and explained the horse was like a “pet” to his daughter.
I saw the weak spot and went for it like a vulture.
“Then what are you going to tell her when she asks where her horsy went? Are you going to tell her the truth, or just lie to her?”

Over the next five years, that $700 horse proved to be highly talented in the show ring, always gentle with children and small animals, and the best friend I’d ever had. We spent hours together, and could practically read each other’s minds. I felt I could almost see his soul when I looked into those eyes which were a shade of brown I had not seen before. I was offered large sums of money for him on more than one occasion, and thought nothing of turning it down. I would no sooner sell my mother, though the thought had crossed my mind.

In late September of 1995 I was near the end of my second month of my troubled pregnancy. I continued to bleed, and my body was simply not doing what it was supposed to. The army doctors told me not to get my hopes up that the pregnancy would last. It had taken me over two years to get pregnant, and this news was devastating.

As I was leaving for work as a veterinary assistant on the morning of September 30^th 1994, I saw that Mario had gotten one of his beautiful forelegs hung in the barbed wire fence. Where other horses would have struggled to free themselves, he was standing patiently, waiting for me to come help him. I threw the truck into park while it was still moving and jumped out to help him. Seeing that the wire had cut deep into the leg, I told him to stand still and I ran to the barn to grab some wire cutters. He stood patiently while I ran back and gingerly cut the wire on either side of the gaping wound, leaving a six inch piece embedded in his leg. I knew pulling it out could do far more damage than leaving it where it was, at that point.

I tied him to a nearby tree and ran to the phone to call my neighbor to bring a horse trailer as quickly as possible. I then called the veterinary hospital at Kansas State University to ask them to prepare for our arrival. I bandaged Mario’s leg around the wire to prevent the wire moving further, and led him slowly on to the trailer.

The veterinary team at Kansas State University took radiographs, and had him in surgery within the hour. It took them three hours to remove the wire and close the gaping wound. I had already been warned that the damage could be too extensive to repair, but I had to try everything I could to save my friend.

For the next three days Mario lay with his head in my lap. Of course I was warned by each shift of veterinarians that sitting with a horses’ head in my lap could end my pregnancy should he get startled or decide to move quickly. I told them all that I knew my horse well enough to know that he would never do any such thing. He was always so gentle, he was incredibly careful with me, even when he was lying in unfamiliar surroundings, poked full of IV needles and had a huge, metal brace on his leg. He barely even wiggled until I was ready to get up or move.

On the third day, the vets came to me with bad news. The damage was so extensive that the chance of recovery was almost zero. The only way to keep him alive would be amputation, which would mean my beautiful horse would never leave his stall again. He would never run with his neck stretched out and his mane whipping around my face. He would never walk with me through the sunset, back towards the barn at the end of a long ride. His freedom would be taken away completely, and he would be in pain for the rest of his life.

I made the hardest decision I had ever made in my life that day. It was up to me to decide my best friend’s fate, to kill him or condemn him. The best choice was by far the most painful. I could make no other choice but to say goodbye to Super Mario that day.

Mario followed me willingly down the corridor on his three good legs to a room with padded walls and floors. I held his lead-rope in my hand as the doctor injected a clear liquid into his neck. I watched as his eye clouded with confusion, and as his knees gave way under his beautiful, athletic body. I was with him until his heart stopped, and his spirit was set free from the bonds of his injured shell. I wept on the neck of his beautiful, lifeless body, taking in his smell so I would never forget it. I said goodbye to the best friend I had ever had.

As Mario’s heart stopped beating, another tiny heart grew stronger. The next day I went in for a prenatal check up to see if the tiny life inside of me had made it through the stress of the last few days. The bleeding had stopped only that morning and the cramping had gone away. For the first time, the heartbeat could be heard clearly on the monitor. My own heavy heart skipped with the joy of hearing my baby’s heartbeat for the first time.

The following March, my son was born. In those first few moments of life, they set him on my chest, and he opened his eyes and looked right into mine. I noticed immediately that his eyes were the most amazing, deep shade of brown… a color I think I’d only seen once before.

In memory of all angels.
Super Mario: 5/15/87 – 10/3/94

What Back-Breaking Work Martyrdom Is!

After three months in ugly-shag hell, my husband and I found a wonderful house way out in the Kansas countryside. It was a 5 bedroom, 2 bathroom house with a wrap-around porch situated on 25 rolling acres. There were outbuildings suitable for the horses and even a pond. The price was outrageously low at sixty-thousand dollars.

We purchased the house and set up the dates and times to do the paperwork and move in. Unbeknownst to me at the time the arrangements were being made, my dearest, kind, caring husband set up the move-in date for the day before he was to leave for a month on an army maneuver... in California. This probably would have been all right had we also hired some movers and a truck, but using “saving money” as an excuse, David decided that we could be self sufficient this go-round. The day before David’s departure, he kindly got a friend to help him move all the “large” furniture to the house, and set it in a large pile in the middle of the living room. That was it. He was concerned about tiring himself out prior to his army adventure, and did not want to over-do himself, poor baby!

Now I’ve always been the strong, self sufficient type, and even at this time I was unwilling to admit that I’d been over-loaded. I stubbornly moved forward, never complaining to my lawfully wedded Bozo-Head that he’d shafted me. Oddly enough, I felt that if I did, I would somehow be admitting a weakness that would make me less attractive to him. Blond moment?

Along with many boxes of books, clothes, dishes, knick-knacks and other items for the house, I was also responsible for moving 17 panels of metal pipe fencing that would be used to complete the broken barbed wire fence around the perimeter of the property. This was rather important before the horses could be turned out in our property. Each panel was 10 feet long by 5 feet high and weighed approximately 100 lbs. each. They had come with the house but had been left down in a wash-out area that was inaccessible to motorized vehicles. The closest I could get my truck was about 30 feet from the wash-out.

One by one I started moving the panels, slinging them over my back and walking sideways through the brush, up the embankment to my truck. At the pace I was going I realized I wouldn’t get the horses out of the barn before my husband got home. In a stroke of brilliance I started moving two at a time, and then three at a time. At 5’0” of height, I’ve always taken pride in my strength. I was really proud of myself when I was able to hoist 300 pounds of metal pipe on to my back and get it up a hill and into the back of my truck. Perhaps this wasn't the most intelligent thing I've ever done, but without my faux pas, I'd have less to write about.

I could practically hear an imaginary crowd of impressed and loving husbands cheering me on as I got the work done before nightfall. Everything on my body hurt, but I was strong, and I knew I’d be fine in the morning. I got the horses turned out and finished the evening by loosing consciousness almost immediately after collapsing into the water bed I had erected myself that morning.

I awoke the next morning and WHOAH! Stupid me, but I had unknowingly made the mistake of trying to move. There was definitely something very wrong. I could not move any part of my body without pain shooting through my back like a flaming bullet. I had no phone service yet, and no one to call even if I had. At the time, personal cell phones were almost unheard of and there was no true internet (not that we owned a computer, anyway). I was a million miles from nowhere (well, maybe 50 miles) and I was very, very stuck! I started to imagine my dried-up carcass being discovered by authorities the following month after my husband finally realized he hadn’t heard from me.

S-l-o-w-l-y I edged one leg to the side of the water bed. After about 20 minutes I had my knee bent over the side and I was gritting my teeth against the pain. Another 20 minutes and I had swiveled myself around enough to get my other foot over the edge. An hour went by and I was s-l-o-w-l-y moving my body to an erect position. With every movement, my breath stuck upon some knife seemingly wedged under my left shoulder blade. My only thought was that somehow I HAD to get myself to a hospital so I didn’t die panty-less and alone in my ugly night shirt.

Upon the success of the ginger removal of my body from its potential water-bed grave, I came to the gloomy realization that I now needed to figure out a way to get afore-mentioned panty-less butt into some sweat pants. The sweat pants took another 30 minutes, and then I had to conjure upon a creative way to get my heap of aching bones down the stairs.

Three hours after I awoke that fateful morning, I finally sitting delicately on the seat of my pick-up truck and driving down eight miles of gravel road on my way to the hospital. I can not tell you in words how driving down a gravel road feels on a back that’s already on fire. Not in words I want to have published, anyway.

I arrived at the Irwin Army Hospital semi-intact with a new goal of getting myself out of my truck and into the emergency entrance. I drove around for quite some time before concluding the nearest parking place was about a half mile away in the lower parking lot. The heck with that! In my gutsiest move yet I parked illegally in the fire lane next to the ambulance doors and wriggled gently out of the truck and on to the pavement. From there I scooted in a bent (or more accurately, broken) fashion up onto the sidewalk and through the doors of the emergency room. At the time it felt like the gates of heaven, as the relief of not being in my predicament alone any more swept over me.

I held my keys out in front of me as I slowly shuffled up to the receptionist.
“I need someone to help me out a bit. My truck is illegally…”
“We don’t offer valet parking, ma’am.” She informed me, gruffly.
At that point the flood gates opened. In broken sentences I attempted to tell her through my tears that I’d hurt my back and I couldn’t make the walk up from the nearest parking place. A passing doctor must have overheard and suddenly there was a flurry of activity around me. I was pushed gently into a wheel chair and taken directly back to a room. I can honestly say that in all my years as an army wife, that day I was given the fastest and best service I’d ever had at any army hospital!

Within an hour a doctor was tending to me. X-rays were taken and the conclusion was ominous. I had torn and separated a large mass of muscle around and under my left shoulder-blade. If this wasn’t bad enough, the muscles on the other side that were still attached were also injured and contracted, pulling everything that remained intact out of alignment. I was informed that I was to be admitted immediately, and might have to stay in some sort of traction for up to six weeks! Holy cow! Holy Horse! I had abandon my horses in a pasture miles from the nearest civilization and couldn’t recall if I’d given them enough water to survive the next day, let alone the next six weeks.

“I’m sorry. I’d love to stay, but I simply can’t right now.” I told the doctor politely. “My husband is at the desert training center for the next month in California.”
“Ma’am, I don’t think you understand. You’re hurt pretty badly and we’re not supposed to let you leave the hospital. We will have to have your husband sent home.”

After giving all the necessary information to the hospital staff, and worrying about how mad my husband would be at me, I finagled my way out of the hospital to just “feed and water my horses and dogs before returning.” I had strict orders to be back to the hospital by that night, and was warned that I left at my own risk.

As luck would have it, my phones had been connected in my absence. I got home and s-l-o-w-l-y fed my critters. I got back into the house just in time to receive a call form my dearest, caring husband all the way from California.
“What’s going on that you needed me to be pulled out to call you?” He inquired in an angry manner.
“I’m sorry.” I said quickly. “I seem to have hurt my back…”
“Do you realize what being sent home right now would mean for my career?” His tone was growing angrier by the word. “If I can’t complete this rotation, I might as well just forget about everything I’ve worked for in the last two years! Now I’m supposed to come home because you pulled a muscle or something?”
“I…”
“Whatever!” He practically shouted. “So what’s the real deal? Do you really need me to come home and ruin my career, or is this some sort of attention thing? I can not believe you had them call me here!”
“I guess I’ll be ok…” I stammered. I was a good girl and certainly did not want to be the cause of such a career ending move as he described. “I’ll be fine…”
“Great.” He said flatly. “Maybe if you REALLY need help, you can get the Jamesons to come help you once a day.”
“It’s 50 miles…”
“I’ll give you the number.”

Happy to have me out of his career’s way, my loving husband told me he loved me, and that he’d see me in a month. I now held the number in my hand for another army couple that lived 50 miles away, but had some knowledge of horses. All I had to do was pick up the phone and explain how stupid I was to some people I barely knew, and ask them to drive a 100 mile round trip to feed my horses so I could lay on my couch doing nothing when I was supposed to be unpacking the house. Great. Just yippee-kiaye great! I would savor every moment of this phone call. After the tears of frustration and loneliness passed, I gathered my courage up enough to call the Jamesons. I was happy to have some help, and having the neither courage nor heart to ask for more, I bravely told them I was sure that three or four days of help would be just wonderful!

Needless to say, I did not return to the hospital. I kept as still as I could on my couch for a few very lonely days. The T.V. got one station which I had no choice but to watch as I could not hold up a book for more than a few seconds. I made my own meals and shuffled down to the barn to tend the horses as best I could. I was miserable, yet proud that I could be such a martyr for my dear, loving husband.

What did I expect form my stoic actions? I expected to be praised at length when my husband got home for being so strong and good natured about everything. I expected to be held in the highest regard for my sacrifices. I expected that my husband would love me more and treat me better for being so understanding and supportive of his career. Did any of that happen?

Rolling on the floor laughing out loud! What happened is my husband realized he had an easy target. He found out that if he treated me poorly and with disrespect, there would be no ramifications for his actions. He learned that I expected to be treated poorly and I would not fight back. If I did put up any fight, I would back down quickly to keep the peace. I’m sorry to say it took quite a few years before I developed any senses to come to. Being a martyr is back-breaking work.

As I write this chapter of my life twelve years after the fact, I still feel the burning ache under my left shoulder blade that never quite healed itself. Looking back with 20/20 hindsight, I know now how that phone conversation should have been different.
“What’s going on that you needed me to be pulled out to call you?”
“You made the choice to leave me here by myself to finish moving heavy objects, and now I need lengthy medical attention. If you’re not at this house in the next 24 hours to help me, I won’t be here when you do get back. If your career is more important than our marriage and my health, you don’t need me to stick around longer than that, anyway. Do I make myself understood?”
I rather doubt he would have left me miserable and alone after that. I suppose it took a back injury and a lot of years for me to "grow a spine" but at least I have one now... albeit a slightly crooked one.