Decisions of life and death

This afternoon, Saturday 13th October 2007 I’m feeling very melancholy.

No other word seems to fit; not adequately describe the sense of…

Sense of loss, I suppose.

Miserable? Nope that doesn’t do it.

Wretched? It’s a good attempt but no, it isn’t in quite the right zone.

Sad? Well yes, that’s very, very close. But it’s so very ordinary and what I feel now isn’t the ordinary level of…

Despair, I guess.

I pause for a very long time to think about the word I’m missing and then drift of in to another place…

A rich, sunny countryside of memories; where the grass underfoot is thick and richly green; speckled with buttercups and daisies.

In this place the sky is mostly brilliantly blue with occasional puffs of white candyfloss-like clouds that scud quickly along, despite there being no discernible breeze.

The temperature is coolly-warm; I’m wearing my usual outfit for a day like this, long leather riding boots, beige jodhs, T-shirt.

This place is in darkest most rural Somerset, near the crest of the hill in Ammerdown Park – from where one can look down on the village of Kilmersdon and its surrounding patchwork quilt of fields of many shades of green and brown.

This is a place of many happy gallopy times – and some impromptu halts followed by illicit picnics.

Beech is over there, underneath the tree beside the bench; head down, munching at the lush greenness.

His ears flick back and forth as he noisily tears the grass and chews, his tail occasionally flicks sidewards to ward off flies from getting too close.

He looks handsome and in such good condition. His beautiful chestnut coat gleams with good health yet he looks cool and laid-back, not like the hyperdriven Thoroughbred his breeding declares him to be.

But this picture is a memory; a gestalt abstracted from far happier times.

I have spent much of this afternoon with my lovely Beech and he doesn’t resemble the boy he was, the Thoroughbred I’ve described.

His coat is a badge of unwellness, his eyes look dim and have none of his customary sparkle and his face looks gaunt.

Even looking at him whilst he’s stationary it’s easy to see he’s in trouble.

But to see him move is terrible.

He can’t walk in a straight line, he crabs up the field sideways. He looks stiff in his back and his hind quarters and he can’t turn a circle anti-clockwise.

I’ve tried so hard for this little horse; I’ve desperately tried to give him a good life.

I’ve lavished care and attention and veterinary skills on him in an attempt to make his life long and healthy, but to no real effect.

It seems that the time has come to at least ask the question whether things have got to the point where I need to take a more final course of action.

In the last few months he’s seen specialists from all of the physical disciplines and every one has said he has no discernible problem.

And yet the boy I know and love so much is having such difficulty just walking and feeding himself.

In winter it would be so much worse; things would be much more difficult for him.

He’s had too many knocks, his head is protecting his body by saying ‘Don’t put weight on that leg, be careful how you rest that one; don’t bend this way, bend that way’.

The end result is that his brain has programmed his body in to an almost impossible sculpture that prevents him from walking straight; even standing still he looks as though he might fall over.

So this afternoon I’m sitting here, remembering former times together whilst at the same time researching horse disposal, (an unpleasant topic to have to go through at the best of times. I’m sitting here blubbing like a baby!) and wondering whether there’s an obscure specialist somewhere who I might have missed who would have a wonder-cure that would make my boy whole again.

I shall look at him again tomorrow.

I won’t not make the decision.

I just need more time.

But I have spoken to a couple of trusted people at the yard and they feel the time has probably come.

As well as these feelings of sadness, I also feel angry – with myself; that I’ve let him down.

B.