by Larry Brody
Last month, Gwen the Beautiful and I traveled to China on a work trip I’ll write about another time. On the third day, while we still were severely jet-lagged by the 13 hour time difference, we got an e-mail from our closest neighbor, Delly the Interstate Trucker.
Billy Morningstar, Delly’s former husband, has been staying with Delly and Buck the Ex-Navy Seal and helping both them and us with various chores for awhile. All was well at Cloud Creek Ranch when we left him looking after our animals, but after three days that situation had changed.
“Yesterday morning Billy found Rosie down and rolling. We were worried about colic so he walked her to keep her up. She has stayed on her feet but is lethargic and won’t eat anything.
“She may have a mouth problem. I’m going to see if we can find anything obvious, but Billy wants to know if there’s anything else you think we should do.
“Huck is doing fine. He’s all ‘What’s the fuss about Rosie? Pay attention to me!'”
This report was followed in the same e-mail queue by another:
“We flushed Rosie’s mouth out. She has no visible injuries, but although she tries to eat she stops right away. We’ll call the vet tomorrow and let you know what he says.”
I answered Delly immediately, and the next day we learned, “Still no eating, or drinking either. The Doc gave her a B12 shot and wormed her in case that’s the issue. He walked the pasture looking for something bad she may have ate but found nothing. This evening she didn’t want to stay on her feet and went down.
“Billy got her up several times and walked her, but as soon as he let go she laid down again. It’s 10 P.M. Billy has been at your place for over 2 hours and just called to say Rosie has started to roll.
“Rosie is not looking good. I’d say to pray a bit. Huck is still fine.”
A few hours later Delly updated us. “Billy just stopped in to get his glasses and said Rosie is getting weak now, and raising her head in a weird way, which has us more worried. Billy hasn’t had much sleep. He is devoted to keeping Rosie on her feet. Tomorrow morning he and I will see if we can get her into the trailer and take her to the animal hospital.”
The next day Delly wrote:
“Rosie trailered beautifully, but Doc says she is colicking and is critical. They tubed her to break loose intestinal blockage and will do it again this evening. I know you are busy. It’s the pits to have to worry like this.. Keep praying.”
An e-mail from the vet came soon after, describing the further treatment that needed to be done and asked for authorization. We e-mailed the go-ahead, copying Delly, who responded, “Seems we are on the right track with Rosie. Doc says she is looking better. Have a good day.”
Having a good day wasn’t exactly possible given the situation, but Gwen and I felt reassured. Until that night, when we received two more e-mails.
First, from the vet:
“…I’m writing with bad news.
“Despite fluid therapy and a variety of pain medication we were only able to keep Rosie comfortable for short periods of time. This morning, Billy and Delly made a difficult decision to euthanize her. In my professional opinion this was the right treatment. I suspect she had a torsed bowel. We are not a surgical facility, and Rosie never would have survived a long trailer ride to the closest one. I’m very sorry for your loss.”
And, from Delly:
“Dearest ones, I am so sorry. We are are shedding tears here as these past few days have brought us so close to Rosie. We feel so bad that you are so far away and have to deal with this long distance.
“I thought if it would be a comfort to you we could bury her beside your pond. May God hold you both close and give you comfort in knowing Rosie is in no pain now and running the Rainbow Pastures with mane flying and that beautiful tail high in the air.
“Billy already had a talk with Huck and the dogs. He said when he went up there everything was still. No barking. No Dixie jumping. He said it was like they knew what happened.
“He said, ‘Huck is crying.'”