My friend Scott Carrino rushed over from work to see the big white horses from Blue Star before they left. He couldn’t speak at first when he saw them, he was so moved and astonished by their size, beauty and spirit. He was struck by the wonder of it. There is a magic about the horses, a dignity, a sense of time and purpose and connection. They can speak to us, they can change us, they can even heal us.
It is a sacred trust to keep these horses in the world, even as they are bring driven away by climate change, the mechanization and pollution of the world, and people who believe it is cruel for them to work and live with people. When you see them, you want to save them, that is the point of the Blue Star farm. Promote the rights of the big horses: keep them alive and among the people they know so well.
Fate’s cone came off this morning, when she was corrected for licking at it, she stopped. I don’t think we’ll need the cone again. She is back at full and explosive energy levels, we took her on three walks today and she is bouncing off the walls. That’s our girl. Her stitches are healing nicely – she was spayed yesterday.
Today she and Red were sitting in the yard and Minnie snuck up to cuddle with Red and get some attention. She loves Red and often cuddles with him and hides behind him. Fate likes to chase her or at least herd her. She hid behind Red until Fate spotted her, and then she ran for the barn. Fate is herself again. I did think it would take more than 24 hours.
Dear Pamela, it is difficult for me, a writer, to convey the impact your visit and your words and great heart and vision had on so many people this weekend at our Open House. Maria wrote so beautifully about it this morning. We have often said to each other that you are not really of this world, and are forever trying to find your place in it. That is, I think, the fate of angels.
In my own way, I understand this struggle, it is why you and Maria are sisters and why you sometimes call me brother.
One woman wrote that your presence at the farm confirmed her suspicion that angels walk among us.
I don’t always believe in God, but I do believe in angels, I married one, and you are another. Or maybe a prophet. Sometimes I think you might be a martyr, a kind of angel sent down to the earth to spread a powerful message and suffer for it. I am so glad I declined your generous offer to be an adviser on the new Blue Star board of directors you formed. If I had accepted, we would probably hate each other by now.
We both walk outside the circle, never inside of it.
I think the test of angels and martyrs and prophets come when they are asked to accept the wisdom of others. It was almost too late for me, not long ago, before I knew you. I hope it is not too late for you. You are being tested now. An angel can illuminate the mind of man, said St. Francis, by strengthening the power of vision. You do this all the time, you did it to scores of people here this weekend. That is valuable work, that is important work, that is work that can change the world.
When angels visit us, we do not hear the rustle of wings, nor touch their golden feathers. We know their presence by the love they create in our hearts, and the ways in which they touch and uplift our souls. This is what I also saw when you visited our farm this weekend and spoke at our Open House – you filled many hearts with love and lifted up so many souls. There was a light, and it shone on so many faces, and it glows still, even days later.
Your love for the horses is a mystical thing to see. You spoke of the horses in so powerful and wise and heartfelt a way, you have the rare genius for putting into words what others feel but cannot say. You give voice to the voiceless, to the searchers. That makes you a wonderful writer as well as an angel. I look forward to teaching you in my blog class in November.
I see that your life came undone in many ways after Paul took his own life a few months ago, the pain and sorrow is etched so vividly in your eyes and your face. I know you feel hurt, betrayed and surrounded by life and people these days, I know you are struggling to decide what to do with your life, and whether or not you belong at Blue Star, the very wonderful place you created in Massachusetts as a sanctuary for the beautiful working horses who need homes and a place to rest.
It takes all kinds of people to make a vision come true, no one can do what you do, you cannot do everything that others can do. Visions, like the flowers in Mithra’s wondrous garden, need to grow and be nurtured. One flower does not make a garden.
I have written that Blue Star is the future, for people, for horses, for animals. I believe it. Many people believe it, because of you, because of Paul. You have shone the light on the horses there, and their great place in our world. Your spirit is in the eyes of the horses at Blue Star, the rafters of the barn, the manure in the fields, the river flowing by your fields, the tree where Paul died. You are the soul of the place.
It is in the nature of mystics and martyrs to suffer, we both know suffering brings with it so many gifts, so much understanding, so powerful a connection to life.
Most martyrs are considered heroic and exceptional by the people who meet or know them, they are respected and have enormous impact on the world around them. They tend to live in their own heads, they are out of sync with much of the world, that is their destiny. They do not fit easily into the conventional world. That is why some people will always need to hate them, and I hope you know that hate is just another form of fear and sadness.
I want to tell you that I love you, which you know, and that the people around you love you, which you may have forgotten. I hope you can hear them when they they talk to you. Sometimes the people who love us the most can muster the courage to tell us what we most hate to hear. I suppose there’s a risk to that, but if we do love one another, and are friends, then it is a small risk. And besides, like you, I have learned to stand in my truth, that is the fabric of identity.
The horses call out to you. You need to do what is best for you, you need to follow your own way, but Blue Star needs to survive and the young people struggling to keep it alive right now are calling out to you also to join them and finish this great work.
Like St. Therese of Lisieux, you practice the Little Way Of Love, not to miss out on a kind word, a smile, or any small gesture which sows peace and friendship. You have broken with the awful logic of violence, exploitation of selfishness. Your love of the horses makes itself felt in every action that seeks to build a better and more loving world. You practice social love, a passion for making society more human.
But sister, I also must tell you what every true healer knows, that grief can be an awful power, it clouds the eyes and the mind and casts shadows on the heart, it cries out for quiet and reflection, not anger and decision. Healing is a soft thing, a quiet thing, a patient thing, it lives in its own world, makes it’s own time. The horses have always helped you heal, they are waiting to help heal you know. My wish for you, since I cannot reach you suddenly, and don’t know where you are, is for you to be still and think and listen and feel.
I believe you were called to speak for the horses, and for the animals of the world, and the people who live with the animals and love them and work with them. I think that is your work, your gift, your destiny. I believe that’s why you are at Blue Star. The Blue Star you have created is a powerful testament to the idea that animals are our partners in the world and powerful spirits on the earth. You have never used them to harm or hate or wound people, yet, as so many martyrs, you have been hated and wounded repeatedly in the service of your cause.
You have saved many animals, and saved many people, that makes you an angel. It also, in our sad and sometimes twisted world, makes you a target, each arrow a painful way for you to grow and be strong.
You have suffered greatly in your life for many reasons. When I close my eyes, I see you speaking for the horses, traveling the country, spreading your message, I see you helping to raise raise the funds necessary to make the horses secure. I can see you watching over the horse spirits in your care, and the people you have lifted up. I see you carrying the message in your powerful words, in the blog you are planning to launch. Helping them heal, as you work to heal yourself.
You are a brilliant messenger, Pamela, filled with spirituality and power, that gift can only be a calling. When you visited us, I could hear the sound of hearts beating, and the feathery wind of souls rising. The animals in the pasture stirred, the dogs quieted, even my puppy lifted her busy head and raised her ears to hear your song.
We became friends when we realized that we both loved Thomas Paine and cherished his fierce passion and independence. You will know what to do, you are smart and strong. You are also in great pain. Martyrs and angels struggle to accept the cold souls and dark corners and small rules of the real world, but that is the world we have been given, hope to save, and need to live in. Those are the cards we are dealt.
Every day of my life, I am called upon to say things I never said before, do things I never did before, hear things I never heard before. That is what it means to grow and learn.
If you trust me, believe me when I tell you the people around you are your friends, they are your salvation.
They love you and care for you. You have created a special place, a light unto the world in a darkening and angry time. You have taught me the message of the horses, and I hope you will go and listen to them now, as you have taught me to listen to them.
What is an angel, after all, but an idea of God? I will pray to the angels and martyrs today, I will pray that you never run away from the horses, from us, from you. It is very difficult for me to imagine a Blue Star without you.
Fate was quiet for most of the evening – she was drugged – this morning, when we opened up the crate, she had returned to normal, tearing around the house, hiding her toys, chewing on my arm, eager to get outside. I took her out to the pasture gate, but no sheep for a week or so.
She is game for anything, the cone doesn’t seem to bother her, she hasn’t paid much attention to her stitches, she is, as always, eager to get on with living in he world and having much fun. I’m leaving this to Maria, she once worked in a vet’s office, but we think the cone will come off tonight or tomorrow.
The stitches look great and Fate seems to be her absolutely normal and hype-kinetic self. The sheep will get a rest, and Red seems quite pleased to be working with me alone once more. Somebody messaged on Facebook that Fate looked sad in her cone, but that is, of course, a projection. Fate was having a good time this morning, she found some of our socks in the laundry basket, ferried them secretly to one of her secret hideouts, which turned out to be underneath my desk and hid them in a corner for later study and exploration. She is doing well.
