#off-track thoroughbred

Honey has really been settling in at the new farm. She loves her new horsey friends and human friends too! I don't usually bother posting pictures of myself, I'm not photogenic at all but my Mom took the best photo ever of Honey and I...so I'm posting it. 

So, Honey got moved to the new boarding place today from the family farm. My trainer came to pick her up and Honey was pretty good about walking down the driveway to the trailer, she had a couple of hiccoughs along the way because she's sore from the founder and walking downhill is no fun; she was a bit apprehensive about stepping into the trailer as well. She wasn't scared of being trailered, just the step to get into it.

Once she was loaded my trainer ties her up and closes the partition gate and walks up to the front of the truck with the driver as I stand waiting next to my Mom on the driveway. Honey was staring out the little trailer window straight at me with this worried look on her face, like "Why aren't you coming too? I have to leave my family?" 

Once they drove off I turned to my Mom and started to cry on her shoulder. It wasn't because I wasn't going to see Honey again but because there has been a lot of memories here at the farm, good and bad but this is the place she pulled me away from the edge of despair.

Our trip together has been trying, some days were full of anxiety and some days were spent lazily lounging in the sunshine together and there were a lot of rainy days that she came and stood in the barn to stay dry (she hates the rain) and we'd hang out together for hours.

She had been picked up around noon and then my Mom had to head back to work. I had wanted to stop by right after they arrived at the boarding place but they had a couple more horses to pick up beforehand so Mom and I went when she got off work at 5:30ish.

When we went to the boarding farm I could see Honey from where we parked and I started walking over to her and I yelled, "Hi, Baby!" and she looked up at me and came over. I met her at the fence and she hung her head over and rested it up against my chest, giving me cuddles and kisses as if she was so relieved that her family hadn't abandoned her. It was like she had been fretting that being trailered somewhere new meant she wouldn't see us anymore. She's not a particularly cuddly mare under usual circumstances but her being so relieved tonight made me weep.

In the time she was at the new barn, before we got there she managed to find herself a little Standardbred boyfriend in the next paddock over, who is about half her size but they were repeatedly loving on one another over the fence.

When we gave her her supper though, she starts eating out of her hay bag. She gets her hay soaked, because of the founder, so she gets it a bit later than the other horses. So by the time Honey's about half-way done her hay, her boyfriend comes over to the fence and calls out to her like, "Come here, baby!" annnnnnnnnnnd she completely ignores him. He tried it about 4 more times while my mom and I were standing there learning the ropes of the new barn.

My trainer stood there watching as he did it once and she says, "I think he's got a crush on her." and my I'm like, "Well...maybe if he had hay in his mouth..."

I really think that she's going to be happy there at the new farm. I think I'm going to be happy there too...but for nostalgia's sake, here's the last photo I took of Big Red at the family farm: