Posts Tagged ‘coping’
Around Again
Sitting on the cold, hard ground with a pile of dog treats beside me, I watched as Asher passionately made another manic pass around the neighbor’s outbuilding. Their cat had dashed under a tiny opening to avoid capture. Sure, I was feeling angry. He had clearly disrespected my commands for the last twenty minutes as he freely trotted along well beyond the repeatedly demonstrated limits of our property, but that wasn’t entirely unexpected.
No, what was irking me even more was the way our horse, Light, walked right up to my face while I was cutting through the back pasture and without warning, reared up on her hind legs giving me a much too close encounter with one of her front hooves. WTF, girl!
My startled audible response was enough to get all the horses to react, rearranging themselves to different positions. I didn’t have time to deal with them at the moment because I was on a mission to regain control of Asher while thinking about what model of shock collar I wanted to convince Cyndie we should buy.
When I crested the hill of the hay field, I caught sight of Asher and saw him turn toward me in response to my call. Then he crossed the road and continued his illicit sniff-fari along the cornfield’s edge in gross defiance.
I phoned Cyndie and asked her to ring the “dinner” bell at our front door because we’ve trained him to return to that and sometimes it actually works. He definitely heard it. He turned and began to run. I thought we had him and I started running for the gate near the driveway to meet him, but he kept going along the road and headed directly for the neighbor’s place with the cockapoo and the barn cat.
Did I mention it was cold? I really didn’t want to be sitting on the ground, but it was obvious that Asher was not going to allow me to catch him. I needed him to come to me. Offering food was not enough enticement. Each time he came around the building, he returned to the spot the cat had snuck under. Each time he took off around again, I moved closer to that spot.
Finally, I was able to reach him and attach the leash to his harness. I am not proud of my performance as I practically dragged him back the long walk to our house on that leash.
The ambiance in the house was warm and pleasant as I whipped dog and leash through the door before slamming it angrily to go feed the horses and pretend I wasn’t thoroughly pissed with Light’s unsafe behavior.
I was triggered, majorly. My old self would have proceeded ignorantly. I wanted to shut down. I didn’t want to look at the dog ever again. I didn’t want to be the only one feeding the horses every day. I didn’t want animals. I didn’t want to be married.
You see where this was headed. But, I know better now. My depression has been treated by professionals.
I have also learned life lessons from horses. I quickly got back to grazing. Deep breaths. When Light began her spastic leg flexing that always ends up spilling her feed pan, I stood beside her and moved my hand soothingly along her chest and leg until she calmed down.
We don’t always take the time to do that for her. In this case, I was also doing it for me.
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Can’t Control
If I could, I surely would have the rain refrain from raining on us during the hours when my friends and I want to go for a bike ride today. It is taking a lot of effort to hold my attitude in a healthy place against the unfavorable weather forecast that has been threatening for days to rain out this event we have been preparing to host.
While we were on a walk with Mike and Barb yesterday, Cyndie found a bright red heart-shaped leaf.
A gift from the universe to help us maintain a focus on love despite whatever rain clouds might come our way.
Last night our world was brightened mightily upon the arrival of my biking buddies Bob and Julie in advance of today’s planned ride. Healthy energy combined and magnified as we introduced Asher to them and then took a walk down to see the horses.
The soil is so desperately dry here and the growing plants and trees are so visibly parched that rain showers are needed more than my friends and I need to bike. I can’t control the amount or timing of precipitation falling today but I can control my reaction to it.
If it isn’t raining for the few hours we’d like to ride, that would be just grand.
It seems weird to say it, but if it rains a lot all day, that would be even better.
The “September fall colors ride with John” can be easily morphed into an “eat a lot of great food together, converse, and play games by the fireplace” with John and Cyndie event.
I definitely can’t always get what I want. I really, really wanted to ride with my friends and enjoy the beautiful scenery on the roads nearby.
I want the type of weather we had here during the four days prior. However, the opportunity to have a great time with good people provides priceless value regardless of the arrival of ride-busting precipitation.
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Our Turn
It arrived with a vengeance yesterday. It is our turn to cope with Earth’s new reality of oppressive heat waves. Tropical dew point temperatures push the high heat to feel ten degrees hotter and land us well into three-digit heat index numbers.
As with every weather extreme, the horses just seem to roll with it. We left fans on high under the overhang and they didn’t expend any more effort than necessary all day long.
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Wearing masks to give their eyes a break from the never-ending harassment from flies, they stayed in the shade where the attack of solar energy was ameliorated by a degree or two. Well, except for Mia. When we showed up to serve their evening feeding, she was out grazing in the back pasture all by herself.
Cyndie decided to walk down and offer Mia a pan in the shade which she promptly accepted. It was uncomfortably hot but not intolerable with pockets of cooler air wafting out from under the shade trees on an occasional breeze.
Asher came out with us and pounced into the woods to force squirrels into hasty retreats to the highest branches above. When horses were tended to, Asher was more than happy to return with us to lie on the cool tile floor of our air-conditioned living space.
I took advantage of avoiding outdoor work by giving in to a delicious afternoon nap in the recliner. What a privileged life we live.
I shudder to comprehend how people in places where this kind of heat lasts for months deal with nights that don’t get cool. We went down to the barn just before sunset to close things up, turn off the fans, and remove fly masks but the heat had barely budged from the peak in the afternoon.
Light was sweating, which wasn’t visible when we fed them earlier. The heat of the day was still accumulating.
Our turn dealing with the blast furnace of this over-heating planet will be mercifully short. After today things will moderate a bit and by Saturday the forecast looks almost chilly in comparison.
The horses give me a sense that they understand this and use that superpower to bolster their impressive art of coping when conditions are just plain miserable.
Our retreat to the geothermally cooled house is a less impressive method of coping, but it is oh. so. effective.
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Happiness Expedition
Surfing for something to watch during a fabulous dinner of a grilled chicken sandwich with a slice of tomato fresh from the garden and just-picked sweetcorn, brought us to the 2017 documentary, “Expedition Happiness.” What a fun surprise that turned out to be since we didn’t know anything about Felix Starck (“Pedal the World”) or Selima “Mogli” Taibi and their excellent chronicle of traveling Canada, the United States, and Mexico in a refurbished school bus they modified themselves.
Their expedition provided plenty of happiness but was not without trials and tribulations. I found it refreshing that they succeeded repeatedly in reframing the difficulties in a way that always saved room for happiness to continue to exist. I would do well to emulate this exercise as often as I can. My happiness tends to get smothered by the depths of instant despair sparked by one thing after another when trying to bring order to life’s ongoing chaos.
Yes, we have an adopted 16-month-old rescued mixed-breed puppy. Yes, we are caretakers of 20 acres of fields and forests. Yes, we have a 33-year-old log home that is beginning to show signs of settling to a point that deserves professional analysis and possible intervention. Yes, we are both retired and living on a tighter budget than our working years. Yes, we are over a year into waiting on a landscape contractor to finish grading the edges of our 900-foot driveway after being told repeatedly we are on their schedule (current “guess” is possibly the week after next –where have I heard that before?).
Still, I am truly happy, even though I felt a scary twinge in my back yesterday while wielding my favorite new hedge trimmer to cut back tall growth that was bending over our path around the outside of the hay field fence. I changed up my routine for a bit and went back later to carefully finish without further physical damage but as the evening wore on, the rest of my body began the natural reaction of tightening up to restrict movement that might exacerbate the disc degeneration affliction.
I’m happy to be newly inspired to try making use of the little plums we get from a few American Plum trees distributed around our land. Cyndie tells me she did try one year but after pitting and pureeing a batch she had to store them in the refrigerator while heading out of town. By the time she returned, they had fermented.
I think the pitting effort dissuaded her from trying again in the seasons since. Maybe if I offer some of my labor I can coerce her into trying again for a jam or other concoction of her choosing.
When the beautiful fruit is falling off the tree onto our walking path, it seems a shame to not put it to use beyond feeding wildlife and decomposing into our soil.
Taking advantage of free natural fruit growing on our land is the kind of thing that provides bonus happiness for our ongoing adventures.
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One Solution
There is one easy solution for me to get a break from any more close encounters of the slithery kind at home. Pack up my things and get out of Dodge, as the saying goes.
But where would I go?
We left Asher at home and skedaddled to the lake where conditions were perfect for floating under the afternoon sun.
The poor pup got as anxious as ever over the obvious signs of our impending departure. While I was finishing up tending to horses down at the barn, Cyndie brought Asher up to the house for his breakfast. My mostly-packed bag was on the floor in our bedroom and Asher helped himself to a box in one of the end pockets that contained a pair of my eyeglasses.
When I stepped into the house, I commented that it seemed strangely quiet. Cyndie told me Asher was on a time-out. I noticed she was holding my glasses and a long-nosed plier. She could work on them all day long but after a pair of eyeglasses have been chomped on by a dog, they will never be the same.
My spare pair made the trip to the lake with me.
I drove up on my own and Cyndie came later with her mom. On Monday, I will head back to take over for our animal sitter, Anna, and Cyndie will stay for a few days to help host a gathering of Marie’s friends.
I’m going to enjoy this break from dog duty to the fullest because when I get home it will be all me and only me in charge of keeping the pooch safely occupied.
I wonder if I can teach him to hunt snakes.
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Heat Remedies
Does anyone know when the climate crisis will become a crisis? I have no idea. Be careful to not fall down in places where the pavement is so hot it will burn flesh this week. I am very thankful we were able to spend the beginning of the week at the lake.
A breeze across the water is a wonderful gift of natural air conditioning. I spent a fair amount of time floating in the lake yesterday but I have no photos of those glorious hours. Cyndie sent me a picture from the pontoon cruise we took with some Wildwood folks and guests on Monday.
Her mom took a picture of Cyndie, Mike, Barb, and me on the deck with fancy appetizers before dinner yesterday.
I didn’t stop eating in time to offer my usual smile. Figs and Brie on toasted French bread slices. Can you blame me?
A week free of training Asher to behave has been a welcome respite. It was an unplanned bonus to have the weather be so hot the lake was the best place we could ask to be. I’m trying hard to hold a positive attitude about the fact we are leaving here today and heading home just as the heat is expected to max out for a couple of days.
I saw a headline last night that reported the seawater of South Florida was reaching hot-tub temperatures. I suspect the coral considers this a crisis already.
It won’t surprise me if Asher starts begging us to take him back up to the lake real soon. In the past, we filled a kiddie pool with water for Delilah when it got really hot but it’s not proving to be an attraction for Asher. We tried hard to coax him in there last week to wash off the fresh horse poop he smushed all over his vest and body. He chose to stand beside it instead.
Maybe today’s high temperatures will change his mind.
If not, I will probably end up being the one laying in it to experience a vague reminder of the big lake we’ve been enjoying up in Hayward for the past week.
It’s been a wonderful time but I won’t deny there’s also a part of me that will be happy to get back to my familiar routine, sweaty chores and all.
Our house has a great geothermal air conditioning feature that will be serving us well as our heat remedy in Beldenville.
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Greatest Accomplishment
I’ve been contemplating a life well-lived after remotely participating in a funeral online last week and then learning of an anticipated death in our friends’ family. Being in the phase of life when I’m closer to my death than I am to my birth, it occurs to me that my greatest accomplishments are quite possibly behind me as opposed to yet to come.
Most days, I feel that my greatest achievement happened when I took action to get treatment for depression. After many years of self-denial about what I was battling, receiving the confirmation of a professional diagnosis was the key that opened the door for my journey toward healthy thinking. Initially relying on medication and talk therapy to interrupt a life-long pattern of dysfunctional thinking, I eventually gained enough command of my faculties to cope on my own, medication-free.
One book I found helpful is “Undoing Depression: What Therapy Doesn’t Teach You and Medication Can’t Give You” by Richard O’Connor.
I still need to treat my natural inclination toward depression every day with healthy thinking, a reasonable diet, regular exercise, and good-quality sleep habits, but reaching the point where I don’t require support from the medical health industry is something I am proud to have achieved.
Last November and December brought a fresh challenge for me in managing the chemicals bathing my brain in the face of grief and fatigue. The combination of needing to first put down our cat, Pequenita, and then our dog, Delilah, mixed with striving to cope with Cyndie’s unexpected injury pushed me to my limits. I was the sole person tending to the horses (during which two highly stressful horse-health challenges arose), cleared snow after two significant snowfall events, and took over all tasks caring for Cyndie and the house while she is laid up.
The physical fatigue left me susceptible to allowing my old familiar depressive behaviors to return. I don’t find that worrisome because years of good mental health have provided a fresh setting for “normal” that I use for reference, allowing me to notice when intervention is warranted. I have a variety of options to employ but the key to being able to self-treat my depression is the “noticing” and consciously changing something in response.
Mostly, I change my thinking. My thoughts are a major trigger to the chemical reactions going on in my brain and body. Sometimes I just need a nap. Often times I just need more time. Especially when the trigger is grief.
Speaking of grief, the horses were giving me some grief recently. This is a case where it would have been nice to have a camera recording what goes on under the overhang when we are not around.
Somehow they picked up the grate in one of the slow feeder boxes and turned it sideways. I guess they’ve got some great accomplishments of their own to neigh about.
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Mostly Coping
Yesterday was something of a between-day. We enjoyed a break because no new snow fell and the winds had yet to kick up significantly when I walked the trash bin down to the road last night. At the start of the day, Mia seemed to be functioning normally and all the horses appeared to have dealt with the overnight cold just fine. Mix wanted to show off her frosty whiskers.
I wanted to take a picture of her cute frozen eyelashes.
Even though the temperature stayed below zero all day long, they warm up enough in the daylight to melt all the frost off themselves.
I filled my day yesterday by plowing about six inches of light powder from the driveway before pulling snow off the roof over the front entrance. Plenty more snow remains to be moved today but if it gets as windy as predicted, I may just wait one more day.
As the sun was about to set, it glowed through a haze of snow blown airborne across our horizon.
I was on my way down to re-attach the mailbox to its post after it got knocked off by the wash from the township snowplow blade. For the moment, what wind we were getting was coming from the west-northwest which is ideal for the orientation of our barn. Under the overhang, the horses can enjoy the relative calm.
With no wind chill complicating their ability to cope with the extremely cold temperatures, they seem to accept the conditions better than we do. I wonder if it is because they have no other choice, while we keep going back inside warm accommodations as much as possible.
Do they keep hoping for a day when the bite of bitter cold loosens its grip? If there is such a thing as horse sense, I hope they do.
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Grief Grind
The confluence of stressors we’ve been facing this fall has combined to make my days a repeating pattern of responsibility that is almost more taxing mentally than it is physically. There is a possibility that I will be learning how to bake Christmas cookies this year as Cyndie’s able-bodied kitchen assistant.
One of the more painful repetitions I’m enduring is the lonesome walk to and from the barn three times a day. With Delilah gone and Cyndie unable, I am on my own –morning, noon, and night– on excursions to feed and clean up after the horses. I am curious about whether or not the horses recognize Delilah’s absence.
She didn’t have a close relationship with any of the horses, but I would think the lack of being barked at might seem refreshing for them.
Oh, how that repeated barking annoyed me. Too bad I am too grief-stricken to enjoy the serenity now available in its absence.
Being a little shorter on patience than my more happy self, horse shenanigans quickly raise my ire. I was granted some respite this morning as they cordially volunteered to assume convenient positions and stayed put to finish each of their own pans of feed. Cleaning up under the overhang is an imperfect science during extreme cold but the horses seem to understand my process and kindly grant me unhindered access.
They have grown more interested in eating hay from the boxes which is nice for me because putting an entire bale in a box is less work than filling multiple nets with a couple flakes from bales. I’m filling both for now since they still seem to prefer eating from the nets but there may be a day when just the boxes will be enough.
Probably not until the fields are green again next spring, but a guy can hope. Maybe by then, my heart won’t be so broken over losing Delilah and Cyndie will be able to walk on both feet.
Surviving the grind of fresh grief is helped by envisioning the future time when immediate stressors have abated. In the meantime, it’s one foot in front of the other.
My daily grief grind.
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Complex Threads
When headspace is getting cluttered by whatever the catastrophe of the day is, it becomes a struggle to maintain a healthy effort toward cultivating daily awareness of the goodness that surrounds me. The innocent joy visible in Delilah’s eyes reveals she isn’t thinking about the ills of war currently happening in Ukraine. I’m not so lucky.
I wish I didn’t have to know about the complexities of what Russia’s Putin will do if he doesn’t get what he wants.
My present concerns about the challenges faced by the people of Ukraine bring up complicated questions I find myself asking about why this deserves any more attention than similar traumas in all the other regions of the world where large populations of civilians have been displaced by lethal conflicts.
Meanwhile, the calamities unfolding every day from the impact of human-driven climate change rage undiminished by any other distractions that succeed in grabbing my attention. How many billion dollars of damage occurred somewhere in the world from flooding rains, wildfires, or wind storms this week?
That doesn’t take anything away from a blissful moment of interaction I was able to experience with Mia yesterday. While a very spring-like snow shower made it look like we were in a snow-globe scene, I wandered up to one of the paddock gates to visit the horses. Mia came up to meet me.
In a rare instance where she didn’t choose to make it a short visit, I found myself looking for ways to give her whatever attention she might desire. After she satisfied herself with facing me and breathing in my smell, she turned around and very obviously waited to see if I would scratch her butt.
How could I resist? While it is true that presenting their butt can be a way a horse shows disrespect or harmful intent, given the circumstances, I read Mia’s behavior as totally benign.
It was snowing and she was wet, plus my reach was limited through the gate, so she received a rather rudimentary scratching. Regardless, she definitely seemed receptive to the attention and followed it up by turning around again to present her mane, which I spotted had quite a dreadlocked snarl.
To my great surprise, she stood patiently while I feebly struggled to make meaningful progress toward detangling the incredibly tight twists of several sections of hair. I did what I could, trying to take advantage of her willingness, but this was a project that needed more than I could provide through a gate amid wet, falling snowflakes.
She decided to present her butt for more attention one last time before I departed from my little impromptu visit.
Before bedtime last night, as I stood at the mirror in the luxury of my bathroom to brush my teeth, I thought about the complexity of my joys and comforts as they contrast with the simultaneous hostility others are suffering.
Somehow, it seems I shouldn’t allow the ills of the world to squelch the goodness I enjoy, but it would be easier to reconcile the dichotomy of the two if my happiness had influence toward easing the difficulties others are forced to endure.
Complex threads, indeed.
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Relative Something 