A Close Call

We live in a windy area, at least it is for 5 months out of the year.  November to April it blows almost all of the time.

In fact the monthly local paper is called the "Allenspark Wind".

The last week or so, the wind has been even worse than usual.  It has been blowing HARD.

We have to haul water by hand to keep the horses' water tank thawed.  One six gallon jug of hot water will usually suffice for the three of them, because they prefer drinking out of the stream at the bottom of their corral.  But for the last few days, I had to haul three or four jugs of water over to them.

"Bill, when I was feeding this morning, I saw the neighbor's trashcan had blown down the hill by the stream" Juanita told me.  Ahhh, that explains the extra usage of the "top" water.  I thought the stream had frozen closed, but there was a monster guarding the water hole.

I went down the hill and dug the garbage can out of the snowbank and carried it up the hill.  Ranger saw me coming and stood next to the feeder, bug-eyed and on full alert.  But Juanita's two greys ran over to me as I was crossing the corral to see what I had.

"Wacha' got, Beel?" they both asked, and snuffeled the can completely until they realized it had no food in it.  Then they wandered back to the feeder to eat hay.

Now, Ranger has always been ... umm... "concerned" about unusual things.  Like mail boxes, windshields, bunny rabbits... so me walking at him carrying a garbage pail would usually send him away in terror.  I have worked on this by making him "touch" things he spooks at.

As I continued carrying the trashcan  up to him, he turned his back to me and stuck his head into the feeder. And pretended to eat.  He held his head down by the hay, and stood there.  I'm not sure if he was even breathing.

I stood next to him holding the can and said "Hey Ranger!"

He pulled his head out of the feeder, gave me a nod and reached out with is chin in the equine equivalent of a "Hey, dude"/fist bump, and then stuck his head back into the feeder.

Wow, how very nonchalant.  "Gosh, you must not be bothered by this can at all, Ranger.  I guess you don't need to touch it".  And I crawled through the fence dragging the can behind me.

As I took the can back to the neighbors yard, I heard him breath again and  say-

"Whew!"