Day: September 24, 2013

I met Dan and Susan the other day because George Forss saw Susan peering in his gallery window and invited her and Dan to come inside. Dan is a retired bush pilot from Ontario, Canada and they decided to vacation near Cambridge because they have read my blog and books and wanted to see the places and people  I write about. They’re staying on a farm that rents some rooms and wandering through the town, having fun. They’ve been to Battenkill Books to meet Connie.

I enjoyed talking with them, and tomorrow, Maria and I are taking them out to the Round House Cafe for lunch and then bringing them over to the farm to meet Simon and Lulu and Fanny and watch Red work with the sheep. They seemed shocked by the invitation for lunch and to visit the farm. They will get over it by dessert, I expect. It is wonderful to have a place people want to come visit.

I’m glad Susan peeked into the window and George saw them. One thing leads to another.

Wally works at the Pompanuck Farm Institute with my friend Scott Carrino and his wife Lisa. Scott’s son Luke spotted this Vietnam Army truck for sale near his school and Scott bought. Wally, who works at Pompanuck maintaining the many buildings and sprawling grounds, loved the truck and he rebuilt every inch of it and is proud of it. Today it was hauling firewood to Pompanuck for the winter. Wally is very proud of his work on the truck.

I have often said that donkeys are the most intuitive animals I have ever been around, although some might disagree. They read moods and intentions. This is a hard week for people who live in this country, even if you don’t watch the news, it always finds you, creeps around the air like toxic gas, leaves an odor and bad taste. Here’s how it works. The donkeys smell emotions in people, we give off what the scientists call fermones (dogs and cats do this as well). If you are still – I always lie down on the ground or sit near them – they will come over to  you, they are both curious and in a curious way, empathetic.

Simon likes to make physical contact, he presses his head against me, touches me with his soft nose, Lulu is often standoffish but when I am upset she will come close and lean against me, the donkey way of being affectionate, of talking. Fanny is more assertive she will come up behind me and nudge me with her nose – pay attention to me!. There is a profound physical sensation attached to this, it is almost as they are pulling the sadness out of me, they are establishing a calming and spiritual connection. This has happened to me so many times it almost seems routine, but it is not.

I scratch the donkeys, rub their ears and necks, in Simon’s case we touch foreheads and I stroke him along the neck and nose. They are healing creatures in ways I will never understand, I always feel stronger and calmer when I have been around them.

Simon is one of the sweetest animals I have encountered, today I was feeling heartsick after a friend messaged me that her daughter and granddaughter had been killed in the Kenya mall attack, and I sat out in the pasture and Simon came up to me and lowered his head and rested it on my head, and then he nibbled a bit on my hat and tried to slip my Iphone out of my shirt pocket and eat it. Failing all that, he just pressed his forehead against mine. “Sometimes, Simon,” I said, “I am heartsick,” and somehow I think he senses that, even if he doesn’t know the word.

The moral of the story is when you are heartsick about the awful things one human being can do to another, it is good to talk to a donkey about it.

If you want to know where the sun is (photographers generally do) then look for a barn cat, they are sun worshippers, they always know where the sun is. The days are getting cooler, the sun is moving around, Flo is moving with it, to the last rays.