The Gift of Pets: Stories Only a Vet Could Tell (16 page)

As the ride progressed, I could see that the lines of stress on Jace’s face were easing as Cynthia’s dialogue continued. His confidence was growing, and his mastery of his mount was having the desired effect as we wound through the trees and up the gentle hills. From my conversation with Tucker, I could tell that he was having fun, too. Both were, I was sure, beginning to experience the wonder and majesty of horsemanship. I began to picture in my mind the time when, as a family, we would head out on trail rides on horses of our own, perhaps packing camping gear behind our saddles for weekend pack trips in the mountains. Cynthia kept turning in her saddle to give me an encouraging look and a furtive thumbs-up. We were doing well!

It was at about the halfway point, where the trail turned into a particularly thick section of woods, that my horse-owning visions came to an abrupt and unexpected end. The four of us were at the tail end of the line of horses that entered that wood. It was the first horse or two in the line that initially disturbed the underground nest of hornets. Upon the initial equine invasion, two or three hornet scouts were dispatched to assess the enemy. They circled the line of horses and returned to the nest to alert the awaiting battalions that an attack on the invaders was necessary. By the time the full brunt of the assault was mounted by the indignant hornets, only the last four horses in the line were still in disputed territory. It was at these horses that the ten or twelve thousand buzzing fighters directed their fury—those and the hapless people who were riding them, unaware of the catastrophe that was about to be unleashed.

My first indication that something was amiss was when Cheyenne veered sharply from the trail and picked up speed, attempting to brush the stinging hornets off on the underbrush that whisked past with ever-increasing velocity. This, unfortunately, did not stop the onslaught, so she lunged, headlong and bucking, and circled back around. I looked up to see Cynthia and Cheyenne bearing down on us at full speed from the right of the path. Still at a full canter, she crossed in front of me and headed into the woods to my left. Just as Cynthia’s cues to Cheyenne when she wanted her to speed up were ignored, so were her frantic attempts at slowing the horse now as it blazed new and exciting trails through the thick undergrowth. Finally, through superhuman effort and sheer force of will, Cynthia brought Cheyenne to a halt in the middle of the thick woods, the mare standing stock-still with feet planted, sweating and quivering in utter fear and confusion.

The sudden disappearance of Cheyenne from the line left an unexpected gap in front of Queen, who clearly felt it a mistake in need of immediate correction. Her impetus to do so was increased exponentially by the sudden and simultaneous attachment of two angry hornets: one to the soft skin on her muzzle and the other to a spot just above her tail. This so surprised her that she ran to the unwitting horse in front of her and immediately plunged her hurting nose into its unsuspecting fanny, then commenced rubbing her nose vigorously on the horse’s rump. Apparently, this is considered among horses to be an incredibly rude gesture requiring a firm response. The horse immediately lashed out at Queen, landing a poorly aimed kick squarely on Jace’s shin.

I watched with horror as the look on Jace’s face turned from engaged and eager to sheer terror in less time than it takes to tell. Time slowed to stop-motion as with dread I watched three or four more hornets begin to hone in on Queen’s neck, sides, and legs. I knew that within just a few seconds, she would erupt like a barrel of Prohibition moonshine. This would be more than Jace could tolerate. An intervention was obviously necessary, so I spurred Bingo firmly in the ribs with my heels, trying to close the distance between our horses. My plan was to reach down, grab the leather reins that Jace had let slip to the ground, and lead Queen to safety. Unfortunately, I had not adequately prepared Bingo for such an act of heroism. Just as I leaned down and reached for her reins, Bingo fell victim to a cowardly but effective hornet attack on his fanny. He wheeled around in the opposite direction from where I was heading and neatly deposited me in a pile at Queen’s feet. Instinctively, and quite bravely, I might add, I reached up and grabbed the end of the reins that still dangled from her bit. In the same instant, Queen recoiled from the writhing human that had suddenly materialized at her feet, rearing back and flailing with her front feet, striking fear into my core. I looked up to see Jace huddled over the saddle horn, hanging on gamely with both hands, his face white and streaked with fear. I realized that continuing to hold on to the reins would be good for neither Jace nor me, and I let go just in time for a hornet to plunge his stinger into my wrist with malevolent vengeance.

It was at about this time that Cheyenne’s temporary paralysis disappeared, most likely cured by another hornet sting, and she erupted again into a headlong rush, Cynthia clinging to her as she ran under branches too low to be ducked, leaving long scratches that oozed parallel stripes of blood on Cynthia’s cheeks and arms. As Cheyenne ran by me, I stood and spread my arms in an attempt to snag her bridle. This caused her to shy sharply to her right, a move for which Cynthia was unprepared. It was only by an amazing feat of horsemanship that she was able to remain in place on her saddle and once again gain control of Cheyenne just in time to avoid a wild race to the barn.

Despite all the excitement, Blaze plodded along the trail with Tucker on board, completely unperturbed by either the rodeos breaking out around him or the threat of the hornets that buzzed by his ears. When he reached the line of horses that had stopped on the trail, their riders watching the scene play out like rubberneckers at a highway pileup, Blaze simply stopped, chocked a rear toe up on the ground, and hung his head in boredom.

Cheyenne’s second outbreak forced Queen back toward the end of the line of waiting horses, where I was now standing. I grabbed her bridle and she calmed noticeably and started rubbing her nose on my arm. Strangely, at this point some signal was sent to the squadrons of hornets to abandon the attack, and they disappeared as quickly as they had come. When it was over, I had been stung a total of four times: once on the wrist, once on the neck, and once on each knee.

The wrangler finally made his way around the waiting line of horses to where the Coston family had gathered at the end of the line. He found me on the ground, holding the bridle of Jace’s mount. Cynthia was gamely steadying Cheyenne’s nerves. The mare was lathered and frantic, fairly cantering in place. Tucker was surveying with envy the excitement of the rest of the family, seated astride Blaze, whom I’m sure I heard snoring. And Bingo was grazing luxuriously on the grass that grew some forty yards away from the trail, his saddle askew, one stirrup squarely on his back and the other hanging from his belly like the pendulum of a grandfather clock. The wrangler stopped, took in the scene, and then turned a stony gaze on me as I stood before him, rubbing the places on my wrist that had begun to swell and turn red.

“Hornets,” I stammered by way of explanation.

But I don’t think he believed me. I doubt he even heard me, since he had already turned his horse to retrieve Bingo. It seemed to take an inordinate amount of time, with me standing self-consciously in front of the group, for him to readjust Bingo’s saddle so I could once again mount up. The other riders seemed put out that their ride had been interrupted. I think it was just coincidence that made the wrangler position me directly behind his horse for the return trip to the barn. From there, I could barely see Jace or Tucker or Cynthia at the end of the line.

By the time we made it back to the barn, the pain from my hornet stings had begun to ease, though the agony of my throbbing ego still smarted. To add insult to injury, it was many days before my fanny had recovered enough so that sitting on it was bearable again. I’m quite sure that was the last time I rode a horse. Since that day, there have been no forces in heaven or on earth that have ever been able to dredge up in Tucker or Jace even the slightest shred of equine interest. Their fancies have turned to water skiing and snow skiing, sports that, as a consequence, have taken on much more importance for Cynthia and me.

It’s really not fair, I suppose, to place the blame for my lost dream on the boys. After all, both of them are away at college now. Cynthia and I could certainly take up our old hobbies once again if we chose to. It’s funny, though, how time alters childhood dreams, how what was a joy to me when I was young now seems simply another chore that would take me away from the familiar comforts of routine. Perhaps it’s the creeping advance of age and the betrayal of youthful priorities. But I don’t think so. That would diminish the value of experience and the accumulated wisdom of maturity and would ignore the evolution of personal development.

The truth is, I am not the same person I was when I was twenty. Life has changed me. Marriage, fatherhood, and a career devoted to significant effort have ennobled, not eroded, me. I have not turned my back on previous passions. I have had new passions open before me. Is this not the stuff of life? Isn’t this evolving self the spice that keeps life interesting and progressive? So celebrate with me the passions of youth. Relive them with nostalgia; recall them with humor. Then turn and allow new ones to overtake you. At fifty, with shoulders now sore from this season’s first slalom run behind our boat, I have found this to be a wise course of action for me. It’s also much easier on my bum. Come to think of it, I haven’t been stung on the knee by a hornet since Jace’s seventh birthday.

My Run-in with the Law

I happened to be standing in the lobby of the hospital one afternoon as a state trooper drove up the driveway in his cruiser. I watched with curiosity as Trooper Dalkins unfolded his six-foot-three-inch frame from the driver’s seat of the car.

Trooper Dalkins had been a client of mine for many years. I had watched his two basset hounds grow from rambunctious adolescents to noble geriatric patients during that time. My mind flooded with the memory of the infected growth on Beau’s front leg, which had responded miraculously to antibiotics after I had assured him and his wife that it would not. Then the scene replayed in my mind of Trooper Dalkins, his wife, and three daughters gathered around the examination table on which Beau lay, too ill to lift his head, before I slipped the medication into his vein that would ease him from his intractable and untreatable illness. It had been a touching and utterly excruciating scene, the tearful good-bye a loving family had bestowed upon a faithful friend after many years of devotion. I liked the Dalkins family very much.

When I had posed the most inappropriate of questions, Trooper Dalkins had answered it without comment or complaint. I suppose I am not the only one who has asked a state trooper the question. He was probably accustomed to it.

“How fast can I really drive on the interstate without one of you guys pulling me over?”

He had laughed offhandedly and told me that it was generally safe to go about six to eight miles per hour faster than the sixty-five limit posted on the highway signs.

“Yeah, if you go any faster than seventy-four, the troopers are going to start paying attention. But slower, you’re generally going to be okay.”

It had been several years since I had posed that question to Trooper Dalkins. But every time I drove past a cruiser hidden behind a knoll in the median of Interstate 81 at seventy-two or seventy-three miles per hour, I thought of him, grateful for the insider information he had provided. Armed with that information, I had not been pulled over on the highway since college days.

I was pleased to see Trooper Dalkins that day, since it had been a couple of years since Beau, his last pet, had passed away. We shot the breeze nonchalantly over the reception desk for a few minutes.

“Hey, you guys need to clamp down on the truckers on the highway a little tighter,” I said to him. “Just yesterday, one of them literally pushed me off I-81 at full speed. He just came over into my lane without a thought. I had to swerve onto the grass to avoid him. That was exciting at seventy miles an hour.”

“Yeah, it can get a little dicey out there, for sure.” He leaned heavily on his elbow on the desktop, his biceps bulging his sleeve. The sidearm and his sheer bulk would be intimidating to any lawbreakers on the highway. He paused for a moment before asking, “So, what kind of car are you driving now?”

“It’s just a little Nissan Maxima,” I responded. “Not much of a car compared to those big eighteen-wheelers.”

“That’s for sure. You gotta drive defensively.” Another pause. “What year is your car?”

I’m not much of a car guy; I am equipped with very little car pride. I’m happy if my vehicle just gets me to where I’m going. Details like engine size, available features, or even the model year don’t stay with me for long. I searched my memory for this bit of trivia.

“Runs in my mind it’s a 2003 or 2004, something like that.”

“So it’s one of the newer body styles, huh?”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

He nodded his head lazily as he scanned the few people seated in the lobby, awaiting their turn to be called into the exam rooms with their pets. Then he turned to me again. “So, what color is your car?”

The question seemed a little strange to me at the time. He must be a car junkie, I thought, unlike me. Or perhaps he was still trying to imagine how a trucker could have missed seeing me and driven me off the road.

“It’s gray, so I guess a trucker could have missed it in the evening light. But I honked and flashed my lights at him, and he just kept coming over.”

Our conversation was interrupted by a page over the PA system, calling me to the treatment room to check on a patient. I waved good-bye to Trooper Dalkins and headed to the back to tend to my patient. The case that awaited me soon erased the mounting confusion about the interaction with Trooper Dalkins, which had begun to tickle at the edges of my consciousness. A young sheltie had had a brush with a car and had suffered a fractured leg. The bone would need surgical repair, a procedure that was scheduled for the next day.