Day: July 2, 2012

What is it about the human-animal bond that causes so many humans to pity animals living their natural lives. What is the great need to put them in a box and see them as piteous, abused and in distress? Why do we think have to right to alter their lives and create paradise for them when they neither seek it or wish it? I saw this happen with Rocky, and in a different way with Simon. It comes up often. The e-mails and messages about the old sheep – they are 80 years old in human equivalent – are coming in steadily.

They seem to be suffering. They seem to be dying. What will happen to them after the summer? Will I take them in? You are heroic. Blessed. Saintly.  Am you rescuing them? Are they in need of rescue? Will you please keep them?

Once again, I am uneasy, as I always am when the truth and reality of the animal world seems to melt a way. The old sheep do not need pity any more than Rocky does. Or than anyone or anything is for living their full life. Are we so afraid of aging, life and death that we think we ought to pretend we can rescue living things from it?

The old sheep have had great lives on a farm with green pastures their whole lives.  Few sheep ever get to live that long or well. The natural time of the old sheep is coming to an end and the farmer knew I had space to give them grass for one last summer. They are not suffering any more than old creatures with stiff limbs suffer. They rest much of the day, graze in the morning and at night, hole up together in the sun for connection, perhaps even comfort.

I do not pity them. They are not sorrowful. They do not need rescuing and I am not a saint for letting them keep my grass short this summer. I am pleased to have them, and they have touched my imagination. Like Rocky, they are so different from the other animals I know. Something very dignified, accepting, beautiful about them. I can’t wait to photograph them more.

They are not in need of pity or sorrow. They cannot and should not be rescued from life. They are not another look-how–sad-is-life-of-animals story. The old sheep are living the real live of real animals in the real world, and by most measures, theirs is among the happier and sweeter stories by far. Animals do not need pity and would not, I believe, want it, even if they understood what it was.

I give these dutiful and simple creatures their dignity of letting them live out their lives without imposing my idea of it upon them. And I give them as well the greatest gift  lots of fresh water, shelter from the sun,  and good grass.

I began chasing sunsets with Izzy after I went to pieces five years ago. That seems like a long time. I put most of the pieces together, and Izzy is gone, but I kept the habit of chasing sunsets, usually with Maria. She is used to pulling over suddenly, pulling out her sketchpad while I run out with my camera and chase the rapidly falling sun. I caught this one last night on Bunker Hill Road. Sunset skies are a lot like life to me in that they sometimes can’t seem to make up their mind what they are – day or night, storm or clearing. This one was all four.

The old sheep spending their last summer here are different than the others. They stay very close together. Their breathing is labored. Even in the heat, they struggle to keep their heads up too long and they lean their heads on one another. Unlike younger sheep, they are all accepting of this. They stay close together. They seem a community to me, suffering the heat, flies and gnats in silence. I think of connection.  In the morning, I will go see them at sunrise again.

Red has woven himself into every part of the farms’ life, and it is already difficult to imagine life without him. This morning, we herded the sheep. Red held Tess in place while we gave her shots. He moved the elderly sheep away from the barn when they tried to come. He got close to them without pushing them or moving them. He stayed absolutely still while the donkeys came over to sniff him and check him. He will soon go with me to the farm stand to meet his girlfriends while I buy some lunch. Photo Album on Facebook shortly.

Our chickens never cease to surprise me, and often make me smile. They pop up on the most unexpected places, this morning on the picnic table behind the farmhouse. Chicken Picnic. Fortunately I had the camera and the right lens. Bedlam Farm is magical for me.