Medicine Man

Lucy is very sad about her shoulder. It hurts, but worse is the feeling of panic when she can't balance herself, because one leg is up in a sling, and she tips over.  This morning, she cried out in distress whenever that happened, and would spin around in circles lying on the ground, unable to figure out how to get up. I could chivvy her into walking by putting a sling underneath her chest, straddling her, and scooting her along, but as soon as I'd stop, she'd keel over. And if I propped her into a sitting position, she'd stiffen her good leg and push herself over onto her bad side.

So I carried her over to George, who came up to the fence. He breathed on her right leg, touched her very softly with his nose for a minute, and then left.

I carried Lucy back into the house and put her down on the rug. She sat, well-balanced and unaided, for a few minutes, before lowering herself carefully on one leg into a controlled lying-down position.

Later in the day, I had her outside again. We're still waiting for her to pee, which is a little concerning, and I'm sure has something to do with the fact that she's unable to position herself. She seemed worried. I carried over to George again, who touched her again with his nose very briefly and wandered off.

I carried Lucy back towards the house. "That's all it takes, Lucy - just a moment with George is all you need," I said. I put her down into a sitting position and walked away a little. Before long she stood up and hopped a few sprightly steps towards me.

Now, in the interests of full disclosure, she had managed a couple of unaided steps earlier in the day, but they were much less agile and controlled. And this time the steps directly followed George's contact with her.

So, is George actually helping Lucy? Or am I now officially going batty?

Assuming the answers to the above are yes and no respectively, I'm thinking that what George is able to do is to convey very clear and concise information to the patient - that he is able to infuse knowledge. I'm a big fan of Chinese herbs, and I read somewhere on the web that they work by imparting information to the body, allowing the body to figure out how to fix itself. Sounds reasonable to me.

This is interesting, because I trained as a teacher of the Alexander Technique, which works by providing feedback and direction (via the teacher's hands) to the student about his or her body use. George seems to be doing similar work, but he is able to remotely telegraph this information in a very clear and targeted manner. It seems that after he "worked on" Lucy, she was able to reduce the disruptive tension which was preventing her from balancing and controlling her movements. In the two cases where I've been aware of him working on me, there was a similar effect.

I feel like I need to raise George's salary.

More Stuff

George, as I have recently related, has been acting agitated at dinner time as the cold weather makes him anxious about food. He's too polite to try and stick his head in the bucket while I'm carrying it, but I've been feeling pressured by him. I always point to his bucket and say (hopefully), "Go on over to your bucket, George."

Today I went in when it was almost dark. George met me at the gate. I didn't say anything except, "Hi, buddy," but George went ahead of me to his bucket and nudged it with his nose.

Earlier today, Lucy the pitbull dislocated her shoulder. Don't ask me how she did it, but the dog gang is together for Thanksgiving, getting up to all kinds of energetic highjinks together. As I was carrying Lucy to the car to take her to the vet, George came to the fence. I carried her over to him, and he sniffed the bad shoulder.

Recuperating

Dog cousins

We have human family visiting for Thanksgiving too, including my oldest daughter and her husband. My daughter has a characteristic which her husband and I find at once admirable and galling: she is always right. She has never liked "ground work" with horses and has always said that you just tell them what you want them to do and they understand it. And of course I always used to extol the value of ground work and thought she was just being impatient. Well, I'm used to her telling me I Told You So.

(Having said that, and also having resolved not to do any more "training" with George, I yesterday discovered that I could get Rose to move her hind legs by doing something with the halter and leadrope and that in Rose's case this might actually be the sort of thing we enjoy doing together.)

Yesterday my daughter and her dog came out into the field to visit the horses with me. After interacting for a little while, she informed me that our horses are like children who have grown up in a household where they are treated as if their opinions are important. She didn't mean it as a compliment. She said, "They keep coming over and trying to tell me what they think about stuff." I reminded her that this was the way she and her siblings were raised, but she reminded me that at least they were shy with adults outside of the immediate family. She likes Rose the best.

It was amusing watching her and George. He wanted to put her into a position of his choosing, and she was having none of it. He didn't get irritated though, cos that's the thing about her - she's bossy, but you don't mind. I should know - she's been managing me for 25 years. Having failed with her, George plonked me into a position near his tail. When I moved, he turned around to look at me with the most comical expression on his face: "Excuse me? Where do you think you're going?"

Anyway, in light of my recent cogitations about George and the thoughts I've been reading from K at Song of the Black Horse, I wonder if his positioning maneuvers aren't perhaps in some way significant. I'll have to think about it some more. But today I was aware of a residual mistrust of George in myself as he put me near his hindlegs, and I know he used to not trust people to be in that position. So maybe he's trying to work on us both.

My next plan is to take my daughter who doesn't like horses to visit George, hopefully tomorrow. My son-in-law yesterday was talking again about how when he was getting George ready to go for a ride, he felt that George was telling him what to do. Daughter-w-d-l-h doesn't like them because she doesn't want to have to be in control of them cos they're big and scary - but if she lets one of the horses take care of her, then maybe she'll have a different experience, and that's the sort of thing that George will like.

Why are you like that, Bridget?

George greets Roger.

Positive Reinforcement

My husband is reading a book called Dog Sense, by John Bradshaw. He shares interesting snippets as he reads along, but the main gist of the book is as follows: We have all been sold a bill of goods with this idea of the dog as a sort of domesticated wolf, whose social life is rigidly controlled by a dominance hierarchy, and who will feel most comfortable if you "show him who's boss." Firstly, the latest research shows that wolves aren't pack animals who live within a military-style pecking order - they live in family groups, where trust and cooperation and flexibility are the norm. Secondly, dogs aren't really at all like wolves anyway. Thirdly, forget dominating your dog - positive reinforcement is where it's at.

Our first exposure to serious dog training was with a Koehler method trainer in Hyde Park in Chicago. All the neighborhood dog owners took this guy's class, and let me tell you we had a neighborhood of dogs who behaved with Teutonic precision and orderliness. Everyone came when called, everyone could heel off leash, everyone sat at the kerb. Oh yes, we were an impressive bunch, and for me the Koehler method has always been the gold standard of dog training. As Koehler himself said - reliability off leash is the standard by which you should judge training methods.

There was only one naysayer in our neighborhood - a Hungarian professor, whose family had been wiped out by the Nazis. He just couldn't stand all this barking of orders and rigid discipline. He was known to dive in to the middle of a training session, scoop the trainee up into his arms and commiserate loudly.

Now it looks like Hungarian Guy was right, as along comes the "latest research," and we find that all this yanking and yelling and pinching and showing who's boss is just not an effective way to train your four-legged friends. Sounds familiar.

Anyway, my husband and I have been on a campaign of playing Mr. and Mrs. Nice Guy to the dogs. And we've seen quite impressive results. Malcolm likes to run after trucks, and he's fond of heckling the horses. Since I've started lavishing praise and sweet talk upon him for everything he does, there's been a big improvement in his response if I call his name when he's off yelling at a horse or vehicle. You can see him trying to withstand  the magnetic force of my voice; but he can't resist it, and he turns and comes over to me. My husband has also noticed that the dogs come over to elicit affection more often - which is especially noticeable with Malcolm, as he is not a particularly outgoing dog.

Now, I can't compare this to a full-blown course of Koehler classes, which I'm sure would yield much more impressive results. However, the off-leash part of the training culminates in using a "light line" to fool the dog into thinking there's no leash attached when in fact there is. The dog disobeys - yikes! - and (barring Hungarian intervention) wrath descends. But the positive reinforcement also seems to set in place a force of action-at-a-distance. You can see it reeling the dog in, and it never gets tangled or caught on bushes.

Good Dogs

So ... I had occasion to think of all this today when I was riding Rose. Which I was doing because my husband and daughter started to complain that we have NO horses who are dead broke (as the unfortunate expression goes). Plus also, I just really had an urge to get up on a horse. Rose was very sweet about getting tacked up and seemed to enjoy the process. Plus also she's a lamb about mounting.

Once up, however, I realized that what we do in fact have is GREEN. This is only the second (I think) time I've ridden her, and the first time was with a halter and two thick, clumsy ropes for reins. This time I had the bitless and was prepared to be a little more fine-tuned.

I rode her in the yard with the other horses milling about - usually at a distance, although they did come over and interfere a couple of times. Rose was quite willing to listen, very blocked in the shoulders, and got a little irritated sometimes when I wanted her to do something she hadn't planned on. She's used to just riding out with George, which involves very little in the way of steering or direction on the part of her rider.

Whatever it was or is that people are supposed to do when they're training horses or whatever it was that I used to do, well all of that is kind of out the window for me these days. I started out not knowing exactly how we were going to proceed.

The positive reinforcement thing came into play, when I realized that the little tap on the horse behind the girth was no longer a resource I could fall back on. A few times Rose refused to move forward. And became a little cross at the idea, as it involved moving away from the other horses. So I just asked her to wait, pointed in the right direction. And eventually she moved forward, and we didn't come to an argument, which is the main thing.

I realized she's very blocked in the shoulders and that we could profitably have a very short ride, focussing on that issue. She's hard to "steer", and I discovered that rather than going straight to working on the bending while moving, it was helpful to come to a halt and draw her attention to her withers, which seemed to be all out of synch with her head and back. Once she felt herself a little more connected at the halt, she was able to move off into a more comfortable walk.

We worked for maybe 10 or 15 minutes, and then I let her go again. I think she sort of liked it and that she is so very clueless that any amount of work we do together will make a big difference. Right now, the idea that I'm communicating with her and making helpful suggestions is a totally novel concept to her. Hopefully as she becomes more accustomed to working, she'll start out with the expectation of a conversation.

The bitless does feel like rather a blunt instrument, but on the other hand, I can afford to be hamfisted and blunt, as I can't cause nearly as much discomfort as I could with a bit. Once Rose is tuned in more, I think it'll be possible to be quite delicate with the bitless bridle. The only other problem with the bitless is that you have to have a noseband, and I can see that, even loose, it constrains the movement of the jaw.

After untacking Rose, I left the saddle hanging on the gate. Bridget came over and knocked at it with her nose. So I put it on her, and then realized - hey presto! - I'd saddled her at liberty, which was something I'd been berating myself for not doing yesterday. It fell off again before I got the girth on, and I didn't bother putting it back, but Bridget and I worked (with treats) on backing, turning, and standing still while I move away from her head.

Then it was George's turn, as my daughter got him to take the foreign exchange student for a ride. Or I should say tried to get him, as he wouldn't be caught - most unlike him. She finally asked for my help, and I went over to him with my arms spread wide, halter dangling in one hand, saying, "George! This is your lucky day! You get to take the girls out!" He came right up and dropped his nose for the halter. Go figure.

He then adopted a rather resigned, martyred, but gentlemanly demeanor, and my daughter got the foreign exchange student situated on his back, and off they went for a nice long walk, nice for the girls at least.

And later, in the beautiful golden evening, I went out to visit with all the horses.

A Wrong Decision

Susie has gone.

Susie, the Westie, beloved of my oldest daughter, who came into our lives one rainy afternoon two summers ago.

We knew when she first arrived - a bedraggled, scrawny, half-blind, half-deaf, elderly castaway - that we wouldn't have her for very long.

There were ungracious people who took her dignity to denote a lack of personality, but by those who knew her best she was dubbed "deep thinker," "old soul," "Doctor of the Church," "Angel sent by God;" and to the other dogs she was a supreme being.

She was rescued several months ago from a severe bout of pancreatitis, but despite the home-made food and the doting care, old age became too hard to beat.

My daughter has been wondering for some time if it would be necessary to put her to sleep. She'd bounce back for a few days, showing a little more interest in life, and then fall back into a befuddled, weak state.

Finally, on Friday, both my daughter and my son-in-law called at separate times to ask what I thought. Susie was having a hard time breathing at night, she'd lost interest in her food, she couldn't really stand up by herself, she had become incontinent, and no longer lit up at the sight of her mistress.

I said it was up to them, and maybe they should consult the vet, but that whatever they decided, it would be ok. My daughter seemed to have resolved that today was the day.

I went to the Adoration Chapel and prayed. I heard nothing but a heavy silence.

On the way home in the car, however, I had a feeling of Susie, finding her own way toward death, as she found her way around the yard - not seeing, but sensing - a little confused, but not worried. I stopped the car. There was a text message from my daughter saying she didn't want to take her to the vet. I replied that she didn't have to.

But there was the fear of Susie's pain. She was such a stalwart little dog, a real soldier, never complaining. She must be suffering a lot. Surely it would be kinder.

Later, my daughter called me in tears. Susie had been euthanized. It had been a terrible mistake. My daughter realized when it was too late. Susie, the needle in her leg, had shown fear for the first time in her life.

I didn't try to say that it hadn't been a mistake. Because it was. I sensed beforehand and should have told my daughter clearly. She said she didn't understand why she hadn't known.

It was a mistake. But it wasn't a terrible mistake. We have learned something. Words are overpowering. They roll over you like rocks tumbling down a hill. They are noisy and pushy and brusque. But the truth is a still, small voice which enters your mind by stealth - you have to quiet down, stop speaking, and listen.

I know from experience that it's not always wrong to euthanize an animal. But in this case we knew. We knew, and we didn't listen. In our fear, we clattered and banged about with words, words which with their own inexorable, soulless logic lead us away from the truth.

Susie was sent in answer to a prayer. In her death she has also given us a gift - if I had followed my intuition, I never would have known how important it was to follow it. I might even have felt smug. But now, faced with the sorrow of having thrown something valuable away, I realize how important it is to push aside distraction and listen to the still, small voice. It's like the voice of the horses.

Susie the bridesmaid, July 2010

And, behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the LORD was not in the earthquake: And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice. (Kings 19:11-12)

Rose Explores

Today, when I opened the gate for George to come out onto the lawn, Rose was at the ready. She'd been watching and waiting for the Open Sesame and had positioned herself to follow George out. A first! She set off happily to see what she could see.

Here is Bridget's opinion of George and Rose going off without her.

George enjoyed a roll on the lawn. He wouldn't stop eating though, and in between gyrations, he continued snatching mouthfuls of grass from a reclining position.

I had big plans for cleaning house and putting away laundry today, but somehow it was so much more enticing to spend time with Rose and George wandering around the yard. When I put my daughter on the bus this morning, it was 40F, but by noontime it was perfect weather for lounging in the shade.

When I caught George and returned him to the field, Rose thought about it and decided, well, maybe she wouldn't go with him. I let her stay out, in the interests of Building Independence.

To my surprise, she attached herself to me and followed me across the yard away from the other horses. She checked in with me a couple of times, touching my arm ever so softly with her nose.

Frequently she looked back to make sure she knew where the others were. When she finally got homesick and headed back, she found George looking over the fence. Poor George - starved for affection. With the fence safely intervening, Rose permitted a little mutual grooming.

Look - you can make out Rose's ribs in this photo. She has such a huge chest that her ribs are visible even when she's quite well covered, which she is at the moment.

When Rose made it clear that she wanted to go back to the field, she was, however, unwilling to let me put her halter on. She doesn't think too much of halters. However, I was determined that if I put the halter on, and then took her to the field where she wanted to go and then took it off again, that would constitute a Good Halter Experience, and so I persevered. I don't believe in pussy-footing around or being sneaky, so I just kept going up to her and saying, "Here's the halter, let's put it on." Took a lot of tries, but she finally agreed.

Rose is what, I believe, Klaus Ferdinand Hempfling calls "The Sceptic." But today, when she was striding around the yard on her own, I thought her face looked rather different - stronger, more authoritative, more outgoing. She's an interesting character, our Rose.

Bright and Frosty

We woke up today to a hard frost, but the day was clear and still. Amazing how much warmer it feels when there's no wind and no moisture in the air, despite the lower temperature.

It was also the first day of rifle hunting season, which meant the dogs had to wear their orange.

The sun lulled the horses into a laid-back mood, and when I went into the field, Bridget was in a mood for socializing. I scratched her, she licked my ears, we played footsie, and she practiced pulling my zipper up and down.

George ambled over and dozed nearby.

He pricked up his ears when he heard a distant rifle shot, but remained otherwise motionless.

This behavior is part of the New George - he stays close by, relaxed, and doesn't come over to claim attention for himself. He came over today once, briefly, and then wandered off to find a pile of hay.

Amigo is visiting again. It's nice to have a lap dog.

Work

In the last few days I've been over to my friend's house twice to trim hoofs. While I was there both times, a third friend, of suitably diminutive stature, came over to work with a pony brood mare, the idea being to polish her up into a riding pony to keep her from the fate of returning to her less-than-ideal prior living situation. She was supposed to be "broke," but it's not clear that she ever was.

So, from upside down underneath a horse's belly, I observed Chicky being worked with on two consecutive occasions. She was lead, lunged, saddled, and mounted on both days.

The first day, you could see she was thinking that it was all rather unprecedented and random - being pulled and pushed (gently, mind you) all over the place, and then having this person sit on you. She looked stiff and confused. The second day, her expression was different - softer, more inward looking, more tuned in, more thoughtful. A light seemed to be glimmering in her face, as if she was becoming aware - "Oh, there's actually something meaningful going on here."

Lately, I've started training our two dogs. They know how to sit and be polite and all that, but I want them to know a little more. I think it's good for them. My previous experience with dog training was in Chicago, where our friendly neighbourhood dog trainer was of the Koehler school, a teutonic and draconian method, which delivers remarkable results. I am using a much watered down version of this with Malcolm and Lucy.

The first few days I took them out, they were like Chicky on the first day. They had no clue something meaningful was occurring, although they submitted to my strange behaviour as best they could. Then something clicked. Their eyes became brighter and more focussed, their responses sharpened, and they became eager to participate.

This got me thinking. There is being with horses, and there is working with horses. The two can overlap; but while the horses know all about the former, only I know about the latter. And I think it's an activity that can be fruitful for both horse and human. How are they going to find out about it if I'm always being apologetic and never present it to them as a thing but only tiptoe around the subject?

With this in mind, I took George out of the field today and said, "Before we graze, we're going to do some practicing for, hmm, let's see - fifteen minutes - well, no, maybe ten."

For starters, he was very distracted and alert about Something Going On on the far hillside. I was confused as to whether I should just let him look as long as he wanted or ask him to pay attention to me. I pretty much opted for the former. (I had the disloyal thought: "Hmm, I bet once you start grazing, you lose interest in what's going on over there." But, in fact, while he was grazing later, he kept stopping to look up at the hillside.)

Despite the distraction, we got in some practice backing, moving hindquarters, and relaxing the head down on request. This all went rather smoothly. Next we turned to the prickly topic of turning towards me while releasing the shoulder away. After the second successful attempt, I decided he could graze. Six minutes is long enough to practice, right?

Again, whilst grazing, I periodically asked George to return to me and relax for a moment. He does it quite nicely now. Not that he says, "Oh what a great idea, June - I feel it will be so good for me to centre myself for a moment!" No, he says, "Ok, here we go again, I get it, this is what you want, right?"

In none of this is there a sense of George awakening to a realization that we are engaged in an interesting project. But I'm hoping that will happen eventually. (Um, maybe if we actually do something he considers interesting .... !)

He is such a prickly character. It would be so easy to work him in a round pen, at a safe distance. I'm sure he'd do great. I know he would, as I've worked him in the round pen before. And maybe, eventually, he'd soften and become trusting. Maybe I'm doing things backwards - I'm starting at a soft position and trying to build up something dynamic. But, backwards or not, this is the trajectory I'm committed to.

I also feel that to some extent, I'm making myself more vulnerable by working close to George. I mean, look, I got bitten already. Sometimes, when I'm next to him, I can almost feel electricity coming off him, like you could get a shock just by getting too close. It's not that he "misbehaves" - for example, he behaves well with my daughter. I've been wondering about that, and I think it's because she's very business-like, and he can maintain his armor undisturbed when she works with him. And if I'm in a hurry and just want him to get on and do something, it's not a problem - but in that situation, he also can preserve his protective shell.

However, he knows that I know his weakness. I can put my finger right on the nerve. He trusts me, but is still very reactive and self-protective, and we're working around an acute awareness of that exposed nerve. Do I even know what I'm talking about? Good question.

George gets on with the important business of the afternoon.

George Loses His Peeve

This afternoon found me out in the horse field with a halter and leadrope. When George presented himself, I put it on him and decided to do a tiny bit of "work."

Having been turned out recently into a new pasture, the horses have been happily grazing for a few days. So they're not so obsessed with getting out to eat. (Alas, we're getting near the end of the new pasture too.) I stayed in the field with George, and so he had no expectation that this was all about going to greener pastures. Also, having the halter on gave a signal, I think, that we were doing a little work, and it helped to keep a connection going between us. Liberty work is nice, and probably ideal, but I think sometimes both horse and human can find the halter and leadrope reassuring.

We only worked for a very few minutes, but I discovered that George doesn't mind backing up in the least if you stay shoulder-to-shoulder with him, facing the same way, and walk backwards beside him. Also, in this way, I found that I could ask him to soften his head to the left while moving his shoulder over to the right as we backed up. This is something I could never get him to do before.

After I took the halter off, he wanted me to stand beside him. So I did. For about an hour. I was determined not to go away as long as he wanted me to stay there.

Little Bridget really wanted attention, and she crept as close as she could without arousing the George stink eye, a distance of about two horse lengths. She stood there for ages, waiting for him to go away, but finally gave up and went off to graze with Rose and Chloe.

As time went by, I gradually moved up closer to George's head. He likes having his ears rubbed. He is so peaceful and gentle and soft at times like these that I realize how important, and how difficult, it is to allow action and movement to arise naturally and softly out of this peace.  At one point, his head was drooping almost to the ground; he flicked an ear and gave my shin a tiny nudge with his nose. I took that as a request to rub his ears some more. Who knows if I was right or not, but he was happy with the resumed ear rubbing anyway.

After we'd been standing there for about an hour, he started nibbling some grass, then caught sight of one of the dogs lying on the ground and went over to check him out. The dog is not so brave without a fence in between them and didn't stick around to be inspected. Then George went over to the water trough. I stayed put, but thought that he was ready to go off and do something else. However, after having a drink, he returned directly to my side. We stood for several more minutes, and then George moved off a little to graze.

But it was apparent that we were now in a different configuration - namely the mares were one group over on one side of the field, and George and I made up another little group in our corner. We stuck together for a while until I left the field, the better to pick the longer grass on the other side of the fence and hand it to him. But once I was out of the field, he quickly lost interest and rejoined the mares.

All this goes to show that despite George's reputation as a ladies' man and patriarchal oppressor, what he really wants is a buddy, which is, I suppose, how he came by his original name.

More importantly, this time with George made me re-remember that it's not all about making the horse do what you want. I could read Resnick and Hempfling and Rashid and still be in the mindset of trying new and ever more subtle ways to get the horse to do my bidding. Yes, I do want the horse to do things I ask him to do. I think that would be fun and useful. But I have to remember that this cannot be the only, or even the primary, motivation behind my desire to have a relationship with this creature.

Another Pretty Day

Today I took George out to graze on the hay field for half an hour. Amigo sat on my lap while George was eating.

Mollified by his feast, George was relatively benign when I took Bridget out and returned her half an hour later. The effect had worn off, however, by the time I'd taken Chloe out for a little stint. He stood pawing at the gate and made faces at her when I brought her back. However, after letting us know that he was Not Happy, he was gracious enough to move aside and let us get in without any problems.

Rose declined to come out when I asked her, although earlier on she'd come up to me and seemed perhaps to want to go out. Her front leg is much better - the swelling has gone down, and she's walking almost normally again.