Fun in Flatland

The Company I keep

I often go to the stables and do nothing more than sit with my horse in his pasture. I find doing this is very relaxing for me, and it has had the added benefit of making my horse relax too because he has figured out that I don't come here just to do something to him or with him. For me it is all about establishing a partnership with my horse.. but that is a story for another post.
When I come out to the stables I am often greeted first by the cat. If I haven't seen him in a few days he is very talkative and tells me all sorts of things with sweet purr/meow sounds. Often I'll pick him up and take him into the pasture with me, or he follows me on his own. I try to find a comfortable place to sit and settle in with the cat on my lap. My next greeting is often by the alpha mare, or the third and last horse in the herd.

Lately my horse comes up to the fence when he sees me coming, which has been a great positive change for him. We have to be careful to watch for the mare because she will chase "Aristoitle" away if I'm not in the pasture to stand between them. Over time I have taught the mare to not crowd my space and keep an arm's length away from me. Aristoitle stands behind me off to my side and I say hi to the mare and then go back to saying hi to Aristoitle.

When I took these pictures yesterday, the mare was not in the pasture so both geldings came over to visit. Aristoitle stood near me and let me pet his face and neck without turning away. He is very un-confident and normally doesn't allow me to touch his face until I've spent some time around him. The other gelding is the opposite- outgoing, searching my pockets for treats, pulling on the tabs on the cuff of my parka, you know, a little TOO friendly. Often Aristoitle will walk away to go back to eating after saying hi to me, and the other gelding hangs around to visit. This is what happened yesterday.

Here I sit on the edge of a plastic water trough, cat on lap. Off camera is gelding #2 trying to come in close for a sniff of the cat, and to continue pulling on my parka. He really wanted to play! He tried to get Aristoitle to play with him and it nearly happened but they both heard me reach into my pocket for the camera and stopped!! It would have been the best photo- both horses standing face to face, with head and neck outstretched looking as though they were going to start biting one another. I'll have to be more stealthy next time.

Aristoitle walked back to the hay and the other gelding came over and stood by my right shoulder, still trying to check out the cat, but I kept moving him back one step until he finally gave up. He stayed with us and dozed off right beside me.

He has napped next to me like this before. One time I was sitting on a tree stump and he came and put his muzzle on my shoulder. I cautiously waited for the lips to start wiggling all around -which often precedes a nip, but he never did any more than that. It was more of a rub... then he just stayed there and fell asleep. He eventually lowered his head so that the flat of his forehead was against my upper arm. The sun had set and I was the only person out with the horses in the quiet pasture. I sat there in the dark and looked into the black, half closed eyes of this horse and had the most magical and peaceful feeling come over me.

I have more photographs to post from today but it's 3:20 A.M., I've had 6 hours of sleep -and for some reason I am still awake! I need to get away from the computer NOW.

Singing the sweetest song as you caught the last rays of the sun
and that is how we ended the day.

Skeptikos

What would you call that sound that someone makes on the phone when they don't believe what you just told them? It's a cross between a short laugh, like huh, and an aspirated sound at the same time. "I'm sorry I won't be able to come in to work today I don't feel well"."Huh. Well thanks for calling." Like they can't wait to hang up because they don't want to hear anything else you might have to say. I heard that sound today.

Excerpt from April 8, 2006

the weather was beautiful with blue sky and passing clouds it was breezy and slightly cool if you stood in the shade but wonderfully warm in the sun when i got home this afternoon i made an instant coffee i poured the hot water into the mug very slowly for some reason and then was drawn to the beautiful dark brown swirls of the coffee and foam as the cup slowly filled to see me looking into the mug like that one would think that i'd never seen anything like it before i have a childlike fascination with the simplest of things i belong outside doing simple work i will pick things up in the street to see them up close i might keep them or not i often have the company of animals instead of the company of people i will listen to a song many times over if it has a base or drumbeat that i like like a moth to the light i pick up colorful moths at the stables and put them in a safe place if they are living sometimes i will take them home if they have died it seems a shame not to admire their beauty

Buy $9.86 worth of groceries and pay with $100.00 bill. Thanks!

Buy 125 items (multiples of several products) and pay $253.00

It was a crazy busy day and people are freaking out because we may have a few snowflakes falling by Monday night. Whatever.

Goodnight.

Today wasn't the most productive day I've ever had. I sat around the house reading various blogs and changed the look of my own blog. I think I will pull out some of my designs and continue to decorate this web page.

I had an idea to write about the weird things going on at work. I deal with the public and it gives me the opportunity to observe human nature. For example: yesterday I sold many bottles of maple syrup and blueberry syrup, and waffles. What causes us to all think about buying the same thing? Does one person see another getting syrup and thinks -oh yeah good idea. From that point does it become a domino effect of some kind? Then there was the customer who INSISTED on bagging her own groceries even though it meant I stood around doing nothing and she held up the line because she couldn't pay with her debit card, answer all the prompts and bag her groceries at the same time.

And can someone tell me WHY people find it necessary to call me by my first name like we are good friends?? "Hello Mallow, how are you? Oh yes would you please ring up a case of that Sonoma Red Malbec, Mallow? Thank you Mallow, goodbye Mallow". Initially it was the men who were saying my name - usually the over 50 crowd, with a few exceptions- Now I see that more women are doing this too. STOP it!! I know I wear a name tag with my name emblazoned on it.. urgh!

Anyway this sure beats the hell out of sitting in a cubicle all day. I was nearly ensnared in a basement cubicle of a well known magazine not too long ago. People raise their eyebrows when I tell them I turned down that gig- but to me that would have been a death sentence.