This is a story about my mother and her horse. These events took place before I was born.
My mother was looking for the perfect horse. She knew she wanted a fine young Arabian. She wanted a horse who would be smart, beautiful, and not too big. A horse she could ride at home for fun, a horse she could spend hours and hours doting on for years to come. My mother found a mare she liked, and put down a deposit for a foal from this mare and a stud she also liked. She waited with delight and great anticipation for the foal, who she just knew would be the perfect horse for her.
My mother visited the pregnant mare often, and in the last week before the birth she nearly lived in the barn. She didn't want to miss anything about this foal's birth. When she tells me about it, I can feel how excited she must have been when the mare went into labor.
But when the filly was born, something was not right. She was weak, and could not stand to nurse. The filly was dreadfully sick. My mother was told that she did not have to follow through with the purchase of this ill foal. She could wait for another season, try again. Who knew if this one would even live?
My mother never had a doubt about what to do. She went in with the mare and newborn, and put her arms around the filly. She carefully lifted the little bay to her feet and guided her nose so that she could nurse. This was her filly, and she was going to take care of her. That was that.
That first week, my mother did live in the barn. She bottle fed her baby horse in daylight and at night. She slept next to the stall, and every time she woke she peeked in quietly to check on mare and foal.
The filly grew stronger every day until she could do everything a normal foal could. Having been raised from the first moments by both her mother, the mare, and her mother, the human, the little filly was always gentle and loving with people.
This little filly was Talana. It has been a long time since my mother was able to dote on her so much as she did in the first months of Talana's life. But I know that Talana remembers that human hands can be kind and loving. I know this because every time I see her, I see how she watches hopefully when anyone opens the front door. Are they coming out to talk to her? Some day, hopefully before the end of this summer, Talana will see me coming out to talk to her every day. Talana will know once again how very much someone wants to be with her and love her, just as when she was a young filly and my mother held her up so that she could eat.
