And then there was three........Skipper's Story

Skipper's Story

I'm not sure if I am ready to write about this or not but I think I need to get it off my chest before I can move on in blogging.  Each time I sit down to try to write a post this issue looms in front of me like a dark cloud.  As most of you know we had to put down our beautiful little pony Skipper a couple weeks ago.  It was very unexpected and happened so fast I could hardly absorb what had taken place.  He was only ten and we had had him for seven years.

When the grandchildren came along we wanted a pony for them to ride.  I had put an ad in that said we were looking for a well broke, quiet, child safe pony about ten years old or so.  We had been asking around at the local Pony Club and friends of ours that have horses to find such a pony.  Nothing.  That's when I put the ad in the paper thinking I would get lots of calls.  Not one except from the man that had Skip.

He sounded like a good prospect over the phone so we decided to take a drive out to see him.  It was getting near dusk and it was a 40 minute drive so I asked the man if he had lights in the barn so that we could get a real good look at him.  Well, he said he didn't have a barn but he would take him in the kitchen if we wanted..........that should have been my first clue.........in the kitchen.

We drove and drove and it was really getting dark.  There didn't seem to have been a house for a few miles and it was a bit errie out there in the woods.  Finally we came to the house and I just sank in my seat.  There is nothing wrong with living modestly but I do have an issue with people that live in filth.  It doesn't cost much for a bar of soap or take much effort to put the trash in the trash cans.  We almost didn't stop.   But we did.

They greeted us and when I asked where the pony was they pointed to an old one horse rusted out trailer.  I could hear movement in there and yes that is where Skip was being housed.  There was no pasture just a round pen with various other poor creatures standing around.  Evidently the other horses were picking on him so they kept him in the trailer, tied.

He was a shy little guy but let me lead him around tip toeing on his inch high shoes that are used for pulling ponies.  The man bragged that he could win a ribbon at any country fair and that they had been using him to yard logs out of the woods.  I felt sick.  His mane was shaved off and his tail was cut off up to the bone plus he was underweight for his 11 hands.  He had a beautiful face with big eyes and I was smitten for several reasons, the main one was to get him out of that place and the second was he did seem gentle and have a kind soul.

We went home that night talking about it all the way.  He wasn't anything that we were looking for.  He hadn't been ridden much if any and was totally lacking in any training except driving.  We would keep looking.

Wrong. 

I couldn't sleep that night very well as all of this was going through my head and when we got up the next morning I looked at the Hubs and we both said that we had to get him out of there.  The Hubs unbeknownst to me took a drive out that morning to check out some things that we needed to know if this pony was going to be around our young grandchildren.  He wanted to know if he would strike out at you if you tried picking up his feet as we knew there was a problem with that among other things.  He also wanted those horrible shoes taken off him but if we had known they were going to tie him up on the ground to do it we would have made other arrangements.

Continued..............