Pig Pen

Twenty-three days.

Chance spent exactly 23 days on injured reserve after a mystery object (probably corn stalk stubble) pierced the soft flesh of his coronary band while we were fox hunting.

About a week ago my vet deemed him rideable. But the ugly, craggy wound made me balk. What started as a tiny blemish widened, creeping across the front of his foot.

Then this week the creep ceased and I realized that if I waited for the wound to heal, Chance would flounder for months. So I retrieved my saddle, still spotted with mud from hunting, and zipped on my chaps. I hooked a halter and lead over my shoulder.

Horses are intuitive... they sense when something's up. Before I lifted the latch on the gate, Chance knew the jig was up. But instead of fleeing he stopped, dropped and rolled.

As if the clods clinging to his coat would chase me back in the house.

I peeled off his blanket -- revealing the only unspoiled real estate on his frame -- and plunked the saddle on his back.

Unfortunately, 23 days of inactivity + 23 new cattle, does not a smooth ride make. As Chance and I trotted Chet's hay field, the neighboring black angus galumphed across their pasture, mashing along the fence to get a closer look. Chance's head shot up like a periscope and the stare-off commenced. Mesmerized, the cattle gazed intently and Chance returned the behavior, refusing to turn his back on the herd.

It was not a pretty ride. But Chance's foot held and I stayed in the saddle. Only one of us walked away muddy.

Spotted

We can always tell when someone's hunting by the river. Long before the first thundering booms waft from the woods, the deer emerge. They commute up the trails and congregate in our pasture or the neighbor's.

I'm no deer expert but from what I've seen, deer prefer to loiter in the woods. In an open field they glide across, snatching a bite or two before moving on. Rarely do they park.

But when someone's hunting, that's exactly what they do. They remind me of kids clustered around home base in a game of tag. Apparently the deer have identified the demilitarized zone.

Eventually they choose a direction and depart single file, with a graceful bounding stride over the fence.

About a month ago I spied this piebald, daunted by the neighbor's fence. She wasn't injured but lacked natural athleticism.

According to one website, piebald (oddly enough, not called skewbald) is a genetic condition affecting less than 1 percent of the white deer population. With it comes other possible defects like short legs or an arched spine. Clearly "Spotty" is afflicted with some abnormality because she balked at the fence line.

She remained trapped in there alone for 20 minutes, utterly vexed by the fencing. But eventually -- spurred by fear from the sounds of a gleeful, shrieking kid --  she frantically squeezed between a wider fence board and bound away with her awkward short stride.

Since then my neighbor Liz has spotted her and snapped much better photos. Spotty's markings are pretty cool and we'll probably see her again if she steers clear of the road. She successfully dodged Maryland's 2011-2012 hunting season.

pix by Liz Zander

Winter Chores

"What a mild winter," everyone says. No frigid chill or permafrost ground. Even now the grass looks November green.

But when I'm standing in a field, the wind burning my cheeks and cutting through my jeans, it's doesn't seem that mild.

I hunker down and wish that I'd wish worn thermal underwear.

I wish I'd worn smart-wool socks.

I hope a sheep doesn't poop on me.

"They're not going to poop on you, they're going to poop on me," Martin says, peering at a hoof.

I slide into the handling chute and wedge myself between the sheep who are crammed so tightly, they look like a package of marshmallows squashed in a grocery cart.

Martin and I are embarking on a chore we should've tackled in the summer: trimming the sheeps' hooves. One of them appeared to be lame.

Not only are we dealing with lousy weather and wily sheep, we have no idea what we're doing.

An instructional website on hoof trimming shows a handler standing the sheep on its hind legs or sitting it down for a trim. But the sheep in the photos are wiry and small -- not like ours that look bloated cotton balls. They outweigh me by 75 pounds. Martin trims them like a farrier shoeing a horse.

Unfortunately, sheep hooves lack the distinctive "cut here" delineation of finger nails. When I search the web I find only a handful of sites and the first sums up my frustration: "There are not many sources of written information on hoof trimming..."

Last summer when Martin bought the trimmers (which look like gardening shears) the guy at Southern States was equally helpful. "You wanna trim a bit but not too much," he cautioned. "Every four to six months."

"That often?" Martin asks. "We've had our for three years and never trimmed them."

"Gosh," the man said. "Then you may want to put them down."

The neglect isn't entirely our fault. The sheep were supposed to be loaner models... borrowed to train Maisie. But then the owner died and by default we inherited them.

The wind whips up, chapping my cheeks but my legs are pretty warm...compressed by the sheep. Like an undertow they carry me around the pen as they dodge Martin.

Martin wades in, snagging each hoof and tentatively paring it away. Eventually everyone's done but Blackie. He so jammed under the rest of the herd, he's almost invisible. Martin dives for him and the entire mass sloshes around the pen, threatening to burst the boards.

"We'll let Blackie go," Martin finally says. "I don't think he's too bad."

Good enough for me. I'm ready to go back inside. I'll be out again in April.

Newbies on the block

There's an old saying that, "Good fences make good neighbors."

Well when your neighbors are cattle, those words really ring true.

I didn't pay much attention to the convoy of pickup trucks in the neighbor's field, huddled in a circle like campers around a fire. The pasture once held horses but it's been vacant for months. And given the fence's wobbly state, I thought the neighbor was shoring up the posts for future horse use. But the newly-installed barbed wire, stretched taut in three strands, suggested otherwise.

By Saturday afternoon a whole passel of cattle were clustered in the corner. Twenty-two Black Angus and a single ginger-white Hereford. They hovered at the top end of the field but gamely approached as we gawked along the fence.

I told the kids that this herd of coal-black cattle might be next year's burgers. But I don't think the message registered.

A curious lot

Number 3 proved the boldest of the bunch.

Right now the herd's a pretty cool landmark on our neighborhood stroll, but I'm not sure how smitten we'll be in July -- when the flies are beastly and the cow pies plentiful. We'll all be coated in repellent.

Brynn was most taken by the new arrivals. I tried to explain the danger of barbed wire in terms understandable to a 20 month old. While doing so, I inadvertently punctured my thumb on a razor-sharp barb and a bubble of blood welled up. That, she understood.

Today's Lesson: Don't Name Wild Animals

I'm accustomed to one kid or another besting the alarm in the morning... creeping up in the darkness to utter a buzzer-beating declaration like, "The toilet's stopped up but don't worry, I fixed it."

We haven't had many of these lately since Hadley -- our resident early-riser -- discovered how to operate the remote control. Cartoon Network keeps her quiet, and my alarm and snooze button are back in business.

But not this morning. Today Cayden padded in and leaned up to my head so I wouldn't miss a word. "Hey Mom, I was watching tv in the basement and I saw Blackie and I petted him."

Apparently Cayden got the jump on the black snake that winters in our basement. Blackie isn't used to the flood of lights so early in the morning, so he slithered back up the wall by the play area and crawled back into the foundation crevice. But not before Cayden caught up with him.

"Martin, are you hearing this?" I said, sitting up in bed.

"Cayden, just because we call that snake 'Blackie' doesn't mean he's a pet. He's a wild animal."

"I know Dad. I didn't say he was a pet. I said I petted him. And not his head, only his tail."

Well hey, that's reassuring. Thanks kid, no need for the snooze button this morning.

Blackie keeps to himself, but in spring sheds his skin in the cellar. 

It's a house plant

We can't invite anyone over for the foreseeable future. I've issued a temporary ban on visitors entering our house.

Not because of our germy kids, or my pneumonia. Not because the family room is a strewn with toys and stuffed animals and puzzle pieces.

No, I just don't want someone to wander in and discover our dirty little secret:

...our Christmas tree is still up.

We appear poised to receive Santa at any minute. Ornaments adorn the tree, the stockings dangle beside the fireplace and the advent calendar crowds the mantle, right beside the Santa snow globe.

I've never been one to hang on to Christmas. We've always booted the tree out on January 2nd. And the nutcracker, the googly-eyed reindeer candles and our kitchy snowmen figurines hide out in the attic.

But this year I've rebelled.

The fireplace room is our private oasis. It escapes the lava-like spread of clutter, and the wooden pocket doors keep the blaring tv, the blaring kids and blaring dog at bay. And with a crackling roaring fire and our perfectly plump and symmetrical douglas fir, the room is positively cozy. More than cozy, it's calming. Better than a glass of wine. (correction: enhanced with a glass of wine.)

Sure, Christmas is last year's footnote. We're already thinking about spring break and summer vacation.

Which is why I'm disassociating the tree with Christmas. Instead, I think of it as a house plant.

A really big house plant... with shiny baubles and twinkly white lights.

A pharmacologic existence

Antibiotics. Anti-inflammatories. Antihistamines. Antiseptics. Prescription pain-relievers. Steroids. Corticosteroids. Oral suspensions (shake well). Topical ointments. Intramuscular injectables. Capsules. Tablets dissolved in water, mixed with applesauce. Nebulized inhalants. Drawing salves, best administered with gloves to keep your nails clean. And pills. Lots of pills.

In the last 10 days, you name it and we've injected it, swallowed it, applied it, soaked it or wrapped it.

It started after Christmas. One kid got sick and we all fell like dominos. It began as a run-of-the-mill cold, barely medication-worthy. But then we hit a rough patch.

While fox hunting on New Year's Day and galloping about, Chance cut his coronary band (that's the soft skin at the bottom of the leg, where hoof growth begins). It looked superficial and I took care of him when I got home.

But the next day he was in serious pain. Three-legged lame. The vet shot him up with antibiotics and anti-inflammatories and left me an arsenal of meds, cautioning me on the risk of bone infection. The syringes were cartoonishly big and each day I'd stick the needle in his neck, jam some paste down his throat, mask 28 pills in applesauce, soak his foot, and then cover the wound in wrap and duct tape.

The shots and the pills Chance could take. It was the order of stall rest -- total confinement -- that turned my horse into a raging lunatic. Borderline dangerous. And I was flying solo because Martin was on the floor, imitating a corpse.

When Martin's back goes out, it really goes out. For two days he lay like a felled tree, buffered by couch pillows. He hobbled around with a sawed-off broom handle.

The days stretched out-- mucking stalls, feeding animals, treating Chance, microwaving pizza, medicating kids, medicating Martin, bathing kids, mucking stalls again, scrounging in the dryer for clean clothes.... I started each morning before dawn and capped the night in the same place: sitting on a deworming bucket in Chance's stall, watching my cold breaths and the steam simmering over the stew of his soaking foot, hot water and Epsom salts.

Eventually Martin crawled to the doctor. He got better. Hadley regained her health and Chance dodged the spread of infection and is sound again. Only Brynn evaded recovery. Despite weeks of antibiotics and steroids, despite a normal chest xray and a normal culture, her terrible cough and runny nose confound her doctors. We live on the verge of hospital admittance.

And that little cold that I ignored... it stuck around. The cough worsened and migrated south, setting up shop in my lungs. I have walking pneumonia.

You've probably heard of sick parents -- too busy to see the doctor -- who finish off their kids' medications. Well, it's sort of like that. Chance's double-strength tablets of Sulfamethoxazole and Trimethoprim -- that's a fancy way of saying "Bactrim." And thanks to Brynn, I know what Bactrim is. Thanks to Chance, I've got a 500-count bottle.

Chance needed 28 tabs a day. One twice a day will do me just fine. Hold the apple sauce.

Dog Walk

This morning Martin said that he'd walk the dog.

Up the driveway that's a 20-minute jaunt. With dawdling kids, 30 minutes tops.

So off they went around 8:30 am. Martin with the chuckit (a tennis ball hurling device); the dog and her ball; Hadley, atop Bugsy; and Cayden, armed with his Nerf N-Strike Recon Dart-Blaster.

They returned. Two hours later.

The kids burst into the kitchen, naked from the waist down. ("The river was wet!" Cayden reported.)

Apparently they walked up the driveway, then cut through the woods, crossed the ridge, followed the berry trail, across the creek and down the muddy river slope. At one point Bugsy leapt across a rain-filled gully; the kids were riding tandem and miraculously managed to stay aboard.

And then they all climbed a deer stand by the river.

"All of you climbed the tree stand?" I asked. "What did you do with the pony?"

"I tied him to a tree," Martin said simply.

I'm glad that everyone survived the pilgrimage. The dog was exercised, the kids had fun. And it cost me only a load of laundry.

But Martin, let me pass along a piece of advice if there's a repeat performance: avoid tying a horse -- even one as saintly as Bugs -- to some sad sapling by the river.

The pony...and the tree..might not be there when you return.

Craigslist

For Sale: one 4-year-old girlie-girl, in excellent condition.

Current owner recommends that buyer have extensive background in fashion, makeup, and hair, and sufficient funds to support frequent wardrobe changes. Interest in shopping and "doing" hair, a plus.

Will consider trade for tomboy of same age. Experience in stall mucking preferred.

If interested, please contact me privately.

Merry Christmas

Although it's been replaced by the politically-correct term "happy holidays," I'm gonna say it anyway:

Merry Christmas. From our crew.

photo by Liz Zander