We now have two dogs, three goats, three horses, and four chickens. I liked it when we had two dogs, three goats, four horses, and five chickens. There was then a nice balance. This year we have now lost one chicken and one horse. I don’t think that we are going to replace the chicken or the horse that passed on.

We are down to three horses. This is what I now keep reminding myself, as I mix the remaining three horses’ supplements, parcel out their three morning, noon, and evening rations of hay, and fill their three water buckets.

The three on the Lander Trail

This evening, as I was coming home from distributing books, I momentarily thought that before dinner, I needed to take Tinni for his evening walk. We would, I thought, check out the neighbor’s place, where they have been doing some serious demolition work. Then I remembered that this is no longer possible.

I instead went and cut some willow – a tree fell across the road. And I thought, oh, I’ll have to set some of this aside in the yard, for Tinni. Then I remembered that because of his age, his front incisors aren’t working very well. At one point Dr. Zach talked about removing them.

I’m glad that this didn’t come to be.

I understand that in thinking in terms of fours, that I created these particular neural pathways. So old habits are going to be hard to undo. At the same time, with the establishment of these pathways has come imagery. I keep picturing Tinni grazing on the lawn. And this morning I looked for his head, sticking out of his shelter. He was, I thought, waiting for his breakfast.

Yesterday I saw a magpie in Tinni’s enclosure – I wondered if this was a buddy of his.

Grief continues to come in waves. Yesterday I cried several times. Today I felt teary eyed, but I did not cry.

And I’ve been attempting to focus on the positive. We do not yet know what kind of a winter we are going to have. I would not have wanted for Tinni to endure another tough winter then die in the spring.

We’ve had Ranger the Goat longer than we had Tinni. He and Rover came to our place shortly after we acquired Raudi and Siggi. Then came Tinni. Ranger has decided to stick around this winter. We have a nice handmade blanket for him. I’m slowly getting all the boxes of books out of the goat shed, so, if need be, he can have his own dry, warm, space.

I think that animals, more so than people, have a say as to when they go. We humans don’t have a say because we think we know what’s to come and consequently expend considerable energy in attempting to avoid it.

It was not the Grim Reaper who came and got Tinni. It was an angel. The angel simply tapped him on the withers and said, “it’s time,” to which Mr. T agreed.

Next: 273. 10/5/22: My Inner and Outer Landscape