Forces of Nature

As I watched the towering wall of dust materialize out of thin air and approach at a phenomenal speed, I had a brief moment to wonder if that is what the Dust Bowl years looked like.  Then it was on us.  Visibility was reduced to almost nothing.  Dust particles stung the skin on my face.  And the wind took my breath away.

Thankfully, the horse that I was attached to was Freya and not Donut, or I might not be alive to tell the tale.  That said, Freya was really not a happy camper.  Just before the appearance of the dust storm, we had watched an entire tree blow over about 200 feet from where we were.  It was already pretty windy at that point.  (And by pretty windy, I'm talking about gusts of 40-50 mph.) 

But my daughter, who may get her own classification as a force of nature, had insisted that Christmas pictures must be done on this day.  Despite the wind (or maybe because of it), the air temperature was warm - in the mid-60s - and it was otherwise a perfect December day to give Freya a bath.

So, by noon, we were out at the barn, with Freya finding herself in the wash stall instead of out with her friends on a beyond blustery day.  She was definitely not her normal self, and she was agitated to be inside.  But Gemma prevailed, and within 45 minutes, Freya had been scrubbed from head to toe.  We put a light cooler on her to help her dry, and my job was to take her outside in the sun and wind to help her dry before pictures.

As I walked Freya outside, I noted that the wind seemed to have picked up a bit more, and was again questioning the wisdom of trying to do fun Christmas pictures.  Freya is generally fine on windy days, but we had passed windy awhile ago, and we were in the vicinity of storm-like winds, despite the bright sun.

Freya decided that she could maybe eat some grass, but no more than 10 seconds had passed before the wind took its first victim on the farm.  A tree blew over at the edge of the woods.  I sort of stared in shock.  And then I registered that the greenhouse we were standing next to sounded like the panes of plastic might rattle free of whatever containment system was holding them.  Or maybe the whole building would just take flight.  Either way, I was becoming aware that standing outside was not a great place to be. 

Freya had that realization well before I did, and she was dancing around on the end of the lead rope, trying to convince me that we needed to move.  Which is what I was planning to do when we got hit by the mini-dust storm.  For a few seconds, all I could do was brace against the dust and wind.  But Freya was becoming increasingly insistent that we needed to get out of there.

Her plan was clearly to head back to her field.  My plan was that we needed to get into the barn.  About one minute of discussion ensued before I finally convinced Freya that we were going in the barn.  She was really not happy about that.  And I can understand her perspective.  I think a lot of animals feel safer outside in a storm because they can see and have the freedom to move.  Unlike people who tend to feel safer inside.

And if we didn't need to do pictures, I would have been happy to turn her back out.  But then I would have incurred the wrath of a tiny 9-year-old:)

So I put Freya in Donut's stall, where she proceeded to express herself in a way that only mares can.  There was much head-flinging and neck-snaking and squealing and bucking in place to demonstrate how very miffed she was to be in the stall instead of in her field.  Then I pointed out that there was a nice beet pulp mash and a flake of alfalfa in the stall for her.  That attracted her attention, but she didn't want to give up too easily.  For about 15 minutes she alternated between grabbing a bite and expressing her irritation.  And then she settled down.  I guess she figured if she had to die in this God-forsaken barn because of a human's stupidity, she could at least have a nice snack first!

At that point, it was just a waiting game.  Gemma and I hung out in the barn for a couple of hours while Freya dried.  The wind would die down for a bit and then pick up again.  It repeated the cycle all afternoon.  Gemma pitched in with some barn chores while I caught up on email and social media.

Then, finally, Freya was reasonably dry and it sounded like the wind was in the blustery category rather than the tornado category again.  It was time to take those pictures.

We started out in the barn.  Gemma was desperate to get pictures by the Christmas tree.  And Freya was actually quite cooperative.  She'd apparently forgiven us for our earlier stupidity and was happy to hang out with Gemma.

I thought maybe we should call it good at this point, but Gemma still wanted to at least try taking pictures outside.  So we saddled Freya up and headed to the Great Outdoors.

Freya was definitely very alert, but I did manage to get a few decent pictures.

It ended up being a long day out at the barn with a little more excitement than I like these days, but the pictures are done.  So at least one force of nature has been taken care of:)

(BTW: In case you are interested, I got the horse Santa gear from Equinavia.  Here are the links:  Horze Santa Horse Cap, Horze Santa Halter, and Horze Santa All-Purpose Saddle Pad.  A search for "Santa" will yield a number of other fun products like leg wraps, a horse blanket, a riding blanket, a helmet cap...)