Archive for the ‘Chronicle’ Category
We Voted
**Firstly, I apologize to anyone who tried to follow my link to the James Lilek column at the StarTribune site yesterday and got blocked by a paywall. I was under the naive impression that a minimum page view was available before the subscription requirement would be triggered.**
Now, on to today’s post…
I do not profess to be politically active beyond making reasonable attempts to vote in November every two years. Yesterday was the first time I ever voted on a day in February. How and why did that happen?
I credit the site vote.org for emailing to alert me of a spring primary election for the Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice “in what’s turned into an expensive and high-stakes battle for control of the state Supreme Court in a key political battleground where power is divided between a Democratic governor and a Republican-controlled legislature.” (https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/21/politics/wisconsin-supreme-court-election/index.html)
There are mentions of the outcome of the Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice election potentially rippling all the way to having an influence on the 2024 Presidential election. That comes across as being a little overly dramatic to me but if my participation yesterday does anything to help offset extremist views and potential outcomes then the short drive to our town hall before the snow started to fly was a small cost of contribution.
I’d be even more thrilled if anything I could do would magically change Putin in Russia into a peaceful leader who immediately ended his wars of aggression. If that happened, I’d immediately seek to turn that magic power toward every corporation and their boards of directors to instantly change every greedy decision that was contributing to cooking the planet into oblivion. Really.
Our votes yesterday were to narrow the selection down to two candidates for the general election in April for a seat on the court. It’s pretty special to be able to participate in our democracy. Now I am returning my attention to our life on the land where our focus is to give four horses a happy home and be good stewards of the fields and trees.
Weather has a way of dominating our activities, especially weather in the extremes, like blizzards that threaten to reach historic proportions.
Guess who will be plowing and shoveling our driveway and walkways for a couple of days in a row?
I vote that we receive the lower end of the snow depth range predicted. Seriously, that would be more than enough for anyone’s favorite winter snow sport. Can we vote more than once?
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Reading Lileks
“It’s not that everything has sugar. It’s that everything has added sugar. That’s the line on the label that gives the game away. The sauce for that frozen chicken entree? Added sugar, 10g. The frozen pancakes? Added sugar, 6g. You buy some oil for the door hinge, and the label says “Added sugar.” There’s probably added sugar applied to public doorknobs so you absorb it topically.”
Yesterday’s StarTribune column by James Lileks resonated so resoundingly for me that I’m going to point you to it today. It reads similar to the kind of silliness you might find in one of my creative posts. See how much of me you recognize in his column about his low sugar/low carb diet…
Click the image above to read his column, “Buttering up our lust for bread.”
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Snow Expected
They tell us to expect fresh snow this week after a prolonged span of February days without frozen precipitation piling up. I have been enjoying the freedom from needing to plow and shovel, but I get a sense that I haven’t enjoyed it as much as I should. Now that this freedom is coming to an end, it feels like I have taken the pause for granted.
I’ve always felt a fondness for the look of one thing fading into another. Especially, gradual gradients. Yesterday, I took pictures of the old snow where it was melting back to reveal the ground below.
It has a bit of a yin and yang feeling to it.
I’m also fascinated by the way leaves melt into the snow.
Looks like there was a fish beside it. Notice the hint of a yin and yang curve in those two, as well.
If the forecast is correct, it will all be covered in white again before the week is over. The cosmic duality of opposing forces of winter precipitation covering the dark earth.
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Injury Assessment
During one period of my career, I volunteered to be a medical first responder to incidents that might occur in the workplace. The company paid for my training to become a certified first responder. One of my motivations for learning advanced first-aid skills was having two young children I was responsible for at home. They would invite friends over for all manner of child’s play which increased the pressure of responsibility I felt, as it also increased the opportunities for someone to get hurt.
If a freak accident were to occur, say something poked in an eye, I learned not to pull it out and some ways to protect the area. Thank goodness I never needed to respond to anything that serious, in terms of injury. Knowing what to do helped ease some of my anxiety over being responsible for someone else’s well-being.
In the workplace, I had the support of many other responders to share the decision-making process when situations arose and I relied on them heavily. In one case where I was the main person tending to an ankle injury at the racquetball courts, I misread the woman’s level of distress and assumed a sprain. After seeing her doctor, she reported there was a broken bone.
I’ve never trusted my interpretation of other people’s symptoms since. It gets even harder when the patient can’t talk because they are a horse. Mia’s behavior tells me she isn’t hurting too badly but she has an ugly-looking abrasion on the back of one of her front feet. My first suspicion was that she scraped it on the icy crust of the snow in the paddocks.
I saw her out beyond the wicked polished ice trying to navigate the deeper snow with Light. In that case, she was limping and favoring it. Once she got back under the overhang, it didn’t look like it bothered her much at all. Our support from This Old Horse stopped by last night to look at it, clean it, and spray on a protective shield, similar to the NewSkin I apply to my hands.
Mia, the most skittish of the four horses, went a little crazy at the sound of the spray can with the metal ball inside. She headed down the hay path toward the waterer and then just kept on going over the slippery ice, through the gate, and out into the hay field. As I was walking down with a lead rope to retrieve her, she headed back toward me, at a full sprint!
Mia stopped right where I was standing. I clipped on the lead, and we walked up under the overhang where Mia stood perfectly while Johanne lifted her hoof to treat the wound.
The wound looks just as fresh and angry this morning as it did yesterday. I am not confident about assessing how serious it could be. Thankfully, Johanne volunteered to return to check on it at noon.
I still don’t like being responsible for someone else’s well-being.
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Horse Smart
This coming April will mark two years since the four retired/rescued Thoroughbred brood mares from This Old Horse arrived at Wintervale. How well have I described the horses in my posts over the years they’ve been with us? Test your knowledge with the following 8 questions (Answer key at the bottom of this post):
- Which horse is able to move Swings off her food?
A) Mix
B) Light
C) Mia
D) All the above
E) None of the above
2. Which horse puts her nostril up to my face to breathe my scent almost every time we meet?
A) Swings
B) Mix
C) Light
D) Mia
E) All the above
F) None of the above
3. Which horse is the most skittish?
A) Swings
B) Mix
C) Light
D) Mia
E) All the above
F) None of the above
4. Which horse always stays dry under the overhang when it rains or snows?
A) Swings
B) Mix
C) Light
D) Mia
E) All the above
F) None of the above
5. When we separate the horses into two pairs, what is the most common arrangement?
A) Swings/Mix; Light/Mia
B) Mix/Mia; Swings/Light
C) Light/Mix; Swings/Mia
D) All the above
E) We never separate the horses
6. Which horse is the slowest at finishing all the feed in her pan?
A) Swings
B) Mix
C) Light
D) Mia
E) All the above
F) None of the above
7. Which two horses are currently supposed to receive an extra serving of feed at noon?
A) Swings and Mix
B) Light and Mia
C) Mix and Mia
D) Swings and Light
E) Non of the above
8. Which horse is the least likely to stand patiently for the farrier to get a complete trim of all four hooves?
A) Swings
B) Mix
C) Light
D) Mia
E) All the above
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Last night I struggled over choosing to close gates to minimize shenanigans again because it is still dangerously slippery on the slopes beyond the overhang but in the end left things open for them to move between paddocks. I’ve been watching them often enough to recognize the posturing that looks a lot like bullying tends to fade after a few spats and all four settle into a zen-like chill. My trust that it stays that way after I’m gone is about 50/50.
I witnessed Light using one of the hay-paths I created to get down to the waterer, although, once she got down there she just turned around without drinking and came right back up. At least it proves they are able to take advantage of it if they choose.
Do you feel like you have a sense of the four horse personalities?
If you scored less than 50%, I should do a better job of describing each member of the herd. Just because I know all the answers to this test doesn’t mean I can leave out these details about the four equine stars of our show.
Test answer key: 1)B 2)B 3)D 4)A 5)A 6)B 7)C 8)C
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Disastrous Footing
One of the things that make rain in February so awful is the aftermath. Any snow that has been packed down by driving, walking, or horse activity turns into a wobbly polished surface of slippery ice. It’s about the worst possible situation for the horses to move around on, especially on slopes like the ones in our paddocks.
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Yesterday morning, while I was doing my best to provide a way for the horses to cope with the slippery conditions, Mia made the mistake of trying to make her way downhill. It was a decision she couldn’t go back on once she made the first move. I was a bit traumatized to be witnessing such a precarious maneuver by a 1200-pound hooved beast. She slipped and stutter-stepped her way down the slope, ultimately avoiding the worst outcome and coming to a stop while still on her feet.
The frantic trip down the icy surface appeared to make it obvious to Mia that she wasn’t going to be able to move around on the ice even though she’d made it to that spot. She seemed to realize her only option was to get back up where she’d come from. After just a few seconds of hesitation, she began moving her hooves to head back up but there was more slipping than stepping happening.
She knew momentum was needed and bobbed her head and flexed enough muscle to attack the incline with some semblance of a run. Somehow, that slipping run was successful and she arrived back to the muddy surface around the overhang.
I was working on covering a pathway with old hay to provide footing to get down to the waterer.
I’d already set out buckets of water under the overhang because it was so treacherous for them to reach the waterer but offering the potential route down felt better than doing nothing at all.
I have no idea how long the icy condition will persist.
In the image above you can see the icy area is darker than the white snow in the distance. I may attempt to rake some sand and/or spread more old hay around on the slope to give the horses options for moving around. The scariest risk comes when one of the horses feels a need to get bossy and the target of their aggression panics in her hasty attempt to escape. If all four horses are confined to the limited space by the overhang, things can get a little testy.
Last night I closed gates to split them into two groups of two to minimize their bickering.
There is no place for shenanigans when the footing gets this disastrous.
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Fine Grill
Despite the dreary conditions yesterday –rain all day in February!?– Cyndie and I braved the low-visibility drive to meet our friends halfway for dinner on Valentine’s Day. Barb and Mike drove east from the far side of Lake Minnetonka and we drove west from our place and we arrived at the St. Paul Grill at the same time –ten minutes before our 6:00 reservation.
Their car was immediately in front of us in the line for valet service. What were the odds of that?
It is such a treat to be pampered by professionals on a night out at a fine-dining restaurant. The doorman wearing a deadman wool felt top hat guided us in dropping off and picking up our cars with wonderful panache. He had us feeling like Hollywood royalty.
Once seated at our table, we met our server, Hillary, who paced everything to a T with the support of a precision crew of runners and bussers.
I guess it proved the adage of getting what you pay for because this was not an inexpensive night out.
It would have been great if I’d captured a shot of the scrumptious food as soon as our plates arrived but doing anything other than eating when dinner is placed in front of me becomes near impossible.
By the time I thought to pull out my phone to capture a record of the aftermath, it was all napkins and coffee cups. You miss out on seeing the fancy Delmonico ribeye steaks, pan-fried walleye, signature hashbrowns with bacon and white onions, and asparagus spears with hollandaise.
Since it was Valentine’s Day, conversation was peppered with recollections of our first dates, engagements, and some foggy details about discovering first pregnancies. I won’t go into detail about the story of a card from a game that read: cooler of organs being misread as “cooler of orgasms.”
Our hearts were filled to overflowing with great friends and great food leading to a really great night out. We didn’t let all that rain dampen our spirits one tiny bit.
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Walking Outside
We achieved another milestone in Cyndie’s prolonged rehabilitation after the surgery to repair her shattered ankle bones. Yesterday, I invited her to take a little walk down our driveway for the first time since last October. With both crutches for support and wearing her new hiking shoes, Cyndie gingerly made her way along mostly dry pavement under warm sunshine.
As we arrived parallel to the barn, Mia took immediate notice and began prancing back and forth, studying what she was witnessing. At first, we took it as a sign of excitement over the discovery Cyndie was actually alive but then it occurred to us Mia was probably startled by the strange metal appendages being used for balance. Anything out of the ordinary always draws intense scrutiny from the horses.
After we passed the hay shed, Cyndie was feeling confident enough to navigate her way over the softening snowpack of the plowed pathway to the barn so she could greet the horses up close.
It was wonderful for me to see Cyndie with the horses again but the whole exercise revealed how far she is from being functional on two feet yet. She has made so much progress moving around in the kitchen I start to think she can do that anywhere. I think the convenient support of counters surrounding her in the kitchen is the secret to how confidently she stands and takes steps there. Now, if she could just take those counters with her when she walks outside, she’d do great.
All joking aside, she is making good progress and we both expect that to continue and become more impressive with each passing week.
There won’t be any athletic sports footwork in her near future, but I bet she will transition away from needing crutch support surprisingly soon. Especially after I hide them and claim I have no idea where they are.
I wouldn’t do anything as devious as that. Especially when she’s just as likely to misplace them on her own and decide to just move on without them.
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Still Melting
Sunny afternoons have become the norm and the melting of snow continues. A larger section of snow has broken off the garage roof.
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I left it lay and headed inside to watch Superbowl hype. I wasn’t very invested in the activity surrounding the game but enjoyed that the scoring was as balanced as it was. It provided a welcome distraction from more serious matters in the world for a few hours. What’s with all the unidentified objects getting shot down from our skies?
If my home team was one of the teams in that game I wouldn’t have enjoyed the stress. I probably would have gone out to shovel snow away from the garage door and read about the outcome after the fact.
I felt a little melted, myself yesterday. Our night out to Chanhassen on Saturday had us up well past a healthy bedtime. We arrived home well after midnight, which cut deeply into my hours of sleep. There is no sleeping-in beyond the normal feeding time of the horses in the morning, so hours of sleep lost at the beginning of my nights are not able to be paid back after sunrise.
It was grand being able to turn in at a decent hour last night. Unfortunately, it still feels like a Monday this morning, which is weird because, in my retirement, there is no real difference from one day to another.
Maybe since it is Monday the 13th it feels spookier. Why didn’t that become a thing? Sounds a lot more ominous than Friday the 13th to me.
I hope you don’t feel melted this morning, especially if you celebrated a little excessively for the big game last night. Congratulations to Kansas City fans!
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Prom Night
It might be a little early in the calendar year for the school prom but that’s where we were last night. Cyndie, Elysa, and I made the long drive to the Chanhassen Dinner Theater to attend a performance of “The Prom” because a Hays relation is in a leading role.
Elysa got us discounted tickets provided to MacPhail Center for Music which led to a festive number of connections throughout the evening.
In a wonderful web of fewer than six degrees of association, Cyndie and I met Austin Wahl. See if you can follow this:
- Our friend, Gary Larson hosts periodic music evenings in his home and invited me to play guitar.
- On one of these occasions, we meet his friend, Ned Wahl who also plays guitar.
- We soon learn that Ned already knows our daughter, Elysa through his interactions at MacPhail.
- Ned’s son, Austin takes a position teaching at MacPhail.
Elysa was exchanging greetings with multiple people from MacPhail connections early on. When she said, “This is Austin Wahl,” Cyndie and I exclaimed, “Ned’s son!”
That was a wonderful bonus on top of the main attraction of our night. Monty Hays performs in the role of Emma, an Indiana teen whose prom is canceled because she is a lesbian who wanted to bring her girlfriend as her date.
Monty’s dad is my nephew, Beau Hays, son of my brother, Elliott.
Family resemblance? If not clearly apparent in our faces, the mannerisms tend to be revealing.
We guessed that it has been 13 years since we have seen each other. Beau reminded me that he has yet to visit our place in Wisconsin because he missed the big family gathering in 2014 when a tire blew out on his way here.
We’ll have to remedy that because brief greetings amidst a swirl of energy during the opening weekend at a dinner theater among friends and multiple generations of family relations is a tad chaotic. They need to come to hang out with some horses and linger with us.
Opening night of “The Prom” was Friday but Monty’s parents, Beau and Katy, were out of town until yesterday, so this was their first time seeing the show. We gathered in the bar after the show to greet Monty where emotions ran high at the sight of not only Mom and Dad, but also unexpected relatives.
A rare sighting of these five Hays relations in one place at the same time.
Monty’s performance is stellar and the musical is an entertaining dose of humor, real-life drama, live music, great singing, and impressive dance routines.
A STORY OF LOVE, ACCEPTANCE AND EMBRACING THE PERSON YOU WERE MEANT TO BE!
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