Sorry, Kids

I've been MIA due to back issues. I'm not as bad off as I was back in February, but I'm not doing so hot. So, the novice farrier installments will have to be postponed temporarily. Fear not, though--it seems that farrier work and unloading hay is actually good for me. My back goes out, not because of the manual labor, but when I seditary, like I was most of last weekend because of the rain.

We will return to our regularly scheduled program shortly, but in the meantime, please enjoy this lovely excerpt from an email I recently got. If any of you non-horsey people out there wonder why I do the things I do (because for my horsey-friends, no explaination is needed), here it is, folks:

"A single woman can learn to survive on the prairie. She can keep horses, build fence and stack hay. She can muck stalls and drive a tractor. She can unfreeze a frozen hydrant, install a stock tank heater and close the swimming pool. She can strip and rebed horse stalls and she can install a gate. She can haul water and break ice and sit up with a colicky horse. She can pick hooves and pull manes. She can treat wounds and kill flies. She can teach an unruly horse to mind. She can calm a nervous horse. She can earn trust and give love. She can kiss noses and snuggle her face into warm, soft shoulders. She can sleep hard at night and work hard during the day. She can keep them safe. She can walk into a cold dark barn on a cold dark morning and hear sweet soft nickers. She can leave that barn to the tune of contented munching. She can survive. But better than that, she can live."

--Author Unknown