thought yall might find this cool! barn cat in MN, USA. black mackerel tabby with low white… with some blue tabby patching :D too skittish for me to handle enough to see how extensive it was, but there were spots across the back and shoulder, on the face, and a very noticeable one on the front left foreleg. sorry for the quality of pictures— again, pretty skittish!
otherwise a very normal cat with a great personality.
Hi everyone, I hope that this is an appropriate thing to post here.
My friend is an equestrian, and is having to put down his horse. This horse was bought from a lesson barn that my friend was working at, after seeng him be ridden until he was so unsteady that he was unsafe for children to ride. That barn had gotten him from a rescue, who had bought him off the Amish. He was in bad shape. It was always intended to be hospice care, for lack of a better word, though the horse ended up being much younger than originally thought, and with a bit more spirit. Unfortunately, his feet have been awful from the beginning, and it has reached a point where he is no longer comfortable.
I have watched my friend fall in love with this horse at the lesson barn, buy this horse, find out just how much younger he is than we were told. I was with him when his hair test came back and we found out his original name! I have watched this horse follow him around like a puppy, and seen him fuss over being quick and thorough with grooming and tack— Gordon was a good boy, but he never got to liking touch, and my friend tried to respect his bitchy faces. He went through chiropractors and bodyworkers and so many kinds of shoes. And I have watched him hurt over this horse day after day for two years now. I’ve never met someone who will love a creature the way he has.
My question is— if you’ll excuse my long-windedness— what can I do now? I live quite a ways away, but I will be going up in a couple weeks to help him move his remaining horse to a new barn, and would love to be able to bring him something to honor the love and care shared between him and this horse. My ideal is to include the horse’s registered name, because of how much it meant to him to find it again, but otherwise I am slightly hopeless. So, I would like to ask you equestrians: what would mean the most to you? What *has* meant the most to you in the past? I am open to any ideas!
ETA: Thank you everyone for your ideas! I have been given several great directions to go in, and feel much less lost. Please give your horses a little more love for me tomorrow.