The chemistry between people and animals is mysterious, mystical, often unknowable. I am fond of Minnie, but I have never been drawn to her. I am drawn to Flo. I have never loved all animals equally, but I think Maria does, her love of animals is a huge part of who she is, and she is coming to know that, in her work and consciousness.
Like many people who love animals, Maria was concerned about being an “animal nut,” or being seen that way. That is the legacy of sensitive children who often grew up being ridiculed. She is coming to terms with who she is, and I see it almost every day in my life and in my photographs. Maria was with me when I first got Minnie in North Hebron nearly six years ago, we were just friends then.
She has always loved Minnie, always been open to her, and when Minnie lost her leg, I knew we had to keep her, have her leg amputated, it would have been so painful to Maria to lose her. Minnie has always been a bit of odd creature, born a feral kitten she has never been easy around people other than me and Maria. Simon tried to stop her, Frieda chased her and I never wanted a lot to with her. Minnie is a trooper, she is coming to terms with having three legs and her relationship with Maria has deepened. Maria has helped Minnie heal, I can see it.
This morning, when I came out of the pasture after the chores, I saw these two pausing to meet with one another in the middle of the yard. It was a touching thing to see, Minnie’s relationship with Maria has made such a difference to her. Clearly, Maria identifies with her in a profound and visible way. This was a portrait of healing to me, for human and animal.
This is promising to be a big week for me, an important week, a new chapter in my creative life. In a day or so I’m going to New York to meet with several editors, one of whom may be my next editor and will hopefully want to publish my future books. Last week, I decided to leave Random House, the only publisher I have had for almost all of my books. It’s time.
My agent, Christopher Schelling has taken my next book proposal – 30 pages long I think – to several publishing houses he things would be right for me. At least one, possibly three, like the proposal and want to talk to me about it. I love to go to New York and pitch books, in another life I would love to have been a writer in L.A. pitching movie ideas. Pitches need to be short, precise and dynamic. I love making a book with an editor.
Christopher is known for matching writers with the right editors and I love and need editing.
I want an editor who will speak to me, not just e-mail me every few months, who wants the same kind of book I want to write and who will be my partner in creating it. Such editors are increasingly rare these days, publishing has become increasingly corporate. I am going to hold out for one, if there are any left. I don’t know how much bargaining power I have, if any, publishing is entering a very different realm. But I have the best feeling about this trip. I’m hoping to carve out some time to shoot more portraits of the New York Carriage Drivers. I hope Maria will come, we love going to New York together, but then, we love doing just about everything together.
Important news on another front:
The carriage trade scored two mighty victories this week, the dynamic and the narrative of their struggle changed tremendously in the past 48 hours. First, the mayor said he was postponing his effort to ban the horses, he said it would happen by the end of the year, not right away. He was facing enormous opposition to the ban and apparently did not have the votes to get it through the City Council. Secondly, the New York Times on Sunday published an editorial urging the mayor to drop the proposed ban and leave the horses alone.
It was a typical New York Times editorial – very late, a bit pompous and a bit clueless but landing more or less in the right place. Where have they been all this time, the paper is just a few blocks from the Clinton Park stables? I loved the line in the editorial urging the mayor to make sure the horses eat together and socialize. I’m thinking maybe the city should mandate a tea party or poker game for them. I should point out that the horses are never alone, they are always around other carriage horses.
The mayor and the animal rights organizations pushing the ban are determined to pursue it, this conflict is far from over. But the weekend’s implications for the animals in our world are enormous.This is a great conflict over how we view animals in our world, it is not ending, it is just beginning. A lot of animals will stay alive longer because of this weekend. The wondrous role of working animals in our lives has been reaffirmed.
Just as the ban threatened to trigger a national movement to remove even more animals from the lives of people, the weekend’s events send a signal that the animal rights message is, in fact, extreme and out touch. So was the mayor on this issue, and he is getting a lesson about real animals and their real lives. The animal rights organizations do not speak for the animals, the people who love them, live with them and work with them do. And are. Quite loudly.
The mayor was wrong, so are the animal rights groups, there crusade is not about animal welfare, it is about the fractured emotions and needs of disconnected and angry people. It is not abuse for animals to work, we desperately need to keep domesticated working animals other than pets in the developed world, there are no places for them to go, no reason to send them away. We need to save them. There are a lot of animal lovers out there, and they made themselves heard, front and center in our greatest city, in front of the whole world.
If this effort to remove the horses is finally beaten back, it may greatly enhance the chances of horses and other animals remaining where most of the people in the country are – in cities and suburbs. Instead of driving the horses away, perhaps the city may now begin to consider ways of making their good lives even better. Closing off more of Central Park to traffic, setting up some protected traffic lanes as they go to and from work, expanding programs where the horses can educate children, perform therapy work for the emotionally challenged and disabled, visit some of the outer boroughs. We need to make it easier for people to own animals and bring them into our lives, not more difficult.
If the city were committed to it, it might even be possible to arrange for a developer to buy the stable properties in exchange for building new and more modern stables for the carriage trade people and the horses. The real challenge is not how to banish the horses, but to keep them and other animals living and working among people.
This weekend is the biggest defeat yet for the notion that it is cruel for working animals to work. It is a defeat for the idea that animals like horses can only live on rescue farms and in the backyards of the wealthy. It may save a number of the horses from the slaughterhouse. It may save New Yorkers from those unspeakably ugly “cruelty-free, eco-friendly” fake vintage electric cars.Send them to Disneyland, not Central Park.
Congratulations to the horses, your message is being heard. And to the people in the carriage trade, you have suffered long enough.
