yesterday

Yesterday was kind of a strange day... 

 To start with, the wind blew HARD for most of the day, which is always unsettling. I had intended to get some work done outside, but when I tried to do some hand watering, the wind was blowing the water sideways and I had to stand just right for any of the water to reach the dry plants. So I decided it was just too windy for outside work and came back inside. 

 Then M had a total disconnect right after lunch... Usually the time from lunchtime through early afternoon is his best time of the day, so this was unusual. 

The disconnects are so hard for all of us, and so painful for him... It's just impossible to describe the trauma of someone disconnecting from reality. 

 It's not like it looks in the movies... It's a horrible, painful, experience for the person going through it. 

 M finally settled down for a (psychopharmacuetically induced) little nap, and while he slept R got school done. 

 She's so funny... She has yet to see the pattern in adding 10 to a number (24+10=34, then 44, 54, etc) even through I've explained it to her countless times. But yesterday, as I started teaching her about perimeter... what it is, and how to measure it... she was right on top of it. I skipped most of the scripted lesson because she "got it" the first time I explained it and was already happily measuring the perimeter of her quesadilla! 

 M wasn't able to get any school done... Once he woke up from his nap we kind of limped through the rest of the afternoon, he was still pretty fragile so I kept things as calm and low stress as possible. 

 That all changed right after dinner though... 

 Dh had gone outside to spread manure in the pasture where Blaze and the goats are. Not thinking that Blaze is a lot younger and trickier than Grant was, he left him out in the pasture while he worked. It took Blaze all of about 10 minutes to dash through the barn to the unfenced, and thick with grass, big pasture. 

 Dh didn't even notice Blaze was gone (he was still mindlessly driving the little tractor around, chopping up and scattering manure!), but M saw Blaze was out and came running to the house in a panic... R (now also in a panic) and I headed out to try and catch him. Unfortunately he didn't even have a halter on and spent the first couple of minutes we were out there dancing away from us. 

 We managed to get his halter on, but then Blaze refused to walk back to the pasture... planting his feet and refusing to take a step. (*rolling eyes* sometimes this horse is just too big for his britches!) I've been using this technique of making him back up when he gets ornery (my understanding is that it's very hard for horses to back up, and most would rather do most anything... even leave a pasture full of long green grass... to avoid being made to walk backwards), so I made him back up and then tried leading him forward again and we got him moving and back into the fenced pasture without too much trouble. 

 With the barn doors open and the wind blowing, there was a lot of dust blowing around in the barn so I decided to take advantage of the wind and clean the barn out. One thing led to another and R and I ended up working for over an hour...  sweeping out the dust, organizing the tack, moving stuff into the hay loft, etc... and doing lots of talking. 

 We corralled the goats and trimmed their hooves (an activity known around our house as the goat rodeo!) and I started teaching her how to use the big trimmers. We gave Blaze some extra treats for being such a good boy (sometimes) and talked about how much we both still miss Grant. 

 It was female bonding at it's best. We worked until (past!) bedtime and the barn looked so good by the time we were done that I was ready to set up a few chairs and a cot and move out there! It was a wonderful way to end a difficult, unsettled day.