A NEW FRIEND

my new friend the horse



What a long nose you have. All the better to sniff you with. A vacuum cleaner with two pipes. Mike Love has been keeping a couple of calves in the meadow by the house. They escaped and
went over to the next farm where a bull was. Mike and crew were out on 4-wheelers looking for them for quite awhile. They found them and put them in another meadow. The brought a horse to this meadow yesterday. I went out a little bit ago to see about getting acquainted with the horse. Nothing to it. The horse practically came running when it saw me walk toward the fence. A tame horse. That's nice. Tapo wanted to investigate too. She watched me talking to the horse from afar. She came hobbling along like she does. At a certain distance, 8 or so feet, she stopped and wouldn't go any closer. When the horse leaned it's head down to meet her, Tapo's eyes got bigger and rounder, on the verge of turning to run, but held it and watched the horse from as close as she dared. She'd never seen a horse before. When I saw her shrink from its size, I was sympathetic. I've never believed a horse had to obey me. I'm no match for a horse. If a horse wanted to take me down, it wouldn't be but a few seconds. They don't have to, but they do. They let us tailless monkeys ride them and corrall them, beat them, treat them like they're not at all conscious.



I will never ride the horse. That's not my goal. I walked up to the horse talking to it, complimenting its coloring, its stature, its eyes. I held my hands out open far enough from the horse's nose to give it a choice if it wanted to sniff. When it reached for my hands I approached it and let it smell both hands, above and below. She sniffed my shirt, rubbed the side of her face on my shirt once. Tame horse, I thought. A happy horse living with people who understood it. I thought I'd get a horse brush from Farmers Hardware and start brushing the horse, for the horse and myself. Seems a human dimension thing to do. Until a century ago, thereabouts, we rode horses, worked horses like tractors, We've known horses intimately in the past and now they are a hobby for a few people and that's about it. I have a fair ability for communicating with the 4-leggeds, not psychic, but paying attention. That's all. Pay attention and they tell me what they want. Like with the horse, I wasn't scratching or petting in ernest, because I didn't want to start something I couldn't stop and I didn't know how much she wanted to be touched. I touched her neck, kept my hands off her face. I couldn't help but imagine what I'd think about it if some other species came up to me and rubbed my face. In a little bit, she leaned her head against the top of a fence post and scratched herself behind the left ear. I scratched behind her right ear and her eye flashed me a look that said, Yeah, that's it.



I came to the house and returned with camera. I let her smell the camera and got some pictures of her. When she started acting spooked by it, I put it down and told her it's all right, I don't have to do it if i scares her. She perked up and let me take all the pictues I wanted. I petted her gently, rubbed her sides, making the decision to get a horse brush and keep her coat fresh for her. We'll have a good, friendly relationship. I've wanted to know a horse for a long time. Not as a creature to dominate and ride and make do my will, though I know that's what the horse wants to do, but one to know, to be a friend with, a chance to experience horse consciousness, which everyone who knows horses say is way up there in intelligence. I think of Gulliver's Travels. If my relationship with the horse is a friend who brushes it, brings it grain sometimes, asks nothing but don't step on me, talks to her, only makes friendly gestures around her, I figure we can't help but have a good relationship. Maybe we can walk around in the meadow together. Just walk and talk. Photo shoots every once in awhile. She may start posing when she catches on to what I'm doing with the camera. One of my dogs did and one did not. By the time I'd finished getting pictures, none of them really worth looking at, she wasn't shy about the camera. I was after pictures that caught her eyes without focusing in on an eye. I was wanting a picture of her eyes seeing. Kind of caught it a little bit.



By the time I came back to the house, I was comfortable believing we can get along very well. Already we've communicated. She has noticed I pay attention. When she taught me to scratch behind the ear, I knew we were connecting. We pay attention to each other now, so we can get to know each other well. This could help salve what I miss most about TarBaby, our communication. I like communication with 4-leggeds. They are not far from us except a major leap of consciousness, like the leap between them and bird consciousness. When I had a dog and chickens, I saw the dog could commnicate with the chickens about like I could with dog. The chickens were two great leaps away from mine, and it's a chasm to cross. But I still was able to
understand to some degree their consciousness in their behavior, how automatic it was. It's that automtic behavior they survive by. A horse to know, to have a mental communication with, will go a long way toward salving the loss of TarBaby. Their minds are gentler than ours by so much it's unimaginable. Earlier today I was typing at the computer and Tapo was hunkered down beside me on the paper to the left of the computer. She was dozing quietly, being nearby.



Things started happening I wasn't expecting and couldn't control, from striking the wrong key with little finger. I set to cussin and Tapo's ears went back. It wasn't like she was afraid of me from tone of voice, but it was like it literally hurt her ears and it wasn't loud. That really gave me pause. I know Tapo has an extensive vocabulary of my words she understands the meaning. She knows the difference between "I love you Tapo" and "Get out of the way." She responds to each according to my words, also tone of voice that aids the meaning. They're very attentive to tone of voice. It made me laugh that I started cussing and Tapo shut her ears down. In advanced Eastern teachings, they say such words carry vibrations that are harmful to the ears of the truly righteous. I've never known a 4-legged, or bird, that wasn't truly righteous, as innocent of human folly as the Savior. The way I see it, is where they are, the Garden is, because they're still in it. We're the ones put out of it, not them. We think too much for our host planet's good. It's the Garden. Our minds want to go off into space, when I figure we're already in space. Right here is the planet that nurtures us. It's home. Why not treat it like home. All the Amazon rivers are mud. The Mississippi is mud. The rivers in Asia are mud. How do fish live in relentless peasoup fog? Catfish that scoop off the bottom are about all that can make it.



I have a horse friend now. A new friend from inside the Garden. Communication is what I find I miss with Jr. We had very different expriences, similar foundational ways of thinking and seeing. Even when his mind was gone. At about the same time as the picture in yesterday's entry, he said out of the blue, "I need to go to the hospital." I asked what for. He said, "Something's wrong with my mind. I want to find out what it is." The main reason I couldn't allow the lumberyards for the old have him, was because they didn't know him. I knew him. I knew how to communicate with him with mind gone. I knew that even though he didn't have mind, he understood. Maybe for a second only, but that was the only second it was for. The moments I had to face doing the dirty work, I reminded myself, "I fought for this," and that set me in motion without regret.