Thread by @homemadeguitars

I made an hour or more of donkey video today - probably way more, I haven't looked yet.
My friend Roger came over in the morning with a big plate of cold cuts and cheese, and stayed and visited a while. I always enjoy Roger's company, he's a restful soul, and we had a good mornin

2. Then I went up to hook up my girls.
Missy and Clara, American donkeys, same as a burro, not the same as a mule. Donkeys. Donks.

3. They haven't been hooked up since the beginning of the end, and they've been getting short shrift.
My donkeys are accustomed to daily attention, near-daily work in harness. They like it. They've gotten nervous and fidgety - there was death in the air.
He has been and gone.

4. I, too, am accustomed to near-daily work in harness. My vision has been drawn to no farther than my arms could reach, and held there for 21 days.
I desperately needed to go outside.

5. I harnessed the girls up and hooked them to the work cart, 2 wheel, single axle, unsprung flatbed about 50" almost square.

6. I had about six or seven dozen eggs that were several years past their sell-by date, so I put them on the work cart, and took the girls for a drive.
When I drive them in the field I rarely ride. I walk beside the cart. They walk at the same speed people do. Same stride length

7. But you can kind of lean back into the lines, and they walk up, and their energy, from their mouths through their bits, down the lines, through my hands up my arms, my torso is gently pulled forward, i pick up and put down my feet almost effortlessly and we move across the 🌎

8. Bandit decided to run with us, which is strictly against the rules, but fortunately we weren't going off the place anyway.
They girls been cooped up for a month, mostly. Sydney took them out a few days ago and they behaved poorly. And she's one of the best.
Bandit was involved

9. But the girls behaved very well. They were glad to be out on the land, their home place, they know all the sights, and even with Bandit periodically bouncing up out of the underbrush and making Clara go about six inches straight up in the air, we did pretty well.

10. And we went back up to the farmstead, and I explained to Bandit that the reason he had this log chain pinned to his collar and the other end clamped in the concrete post vise, was because I needed him to stay home while we went visiting.
And he did.

11. The gravel road on the north side goes up to the highway, and down there about ¼ mile to a slightly bigger highway, and when you get to that junction you're looking into Roger's yard. His driveway is maybe 30 steps off to your right and a left turn across into his drive.

12. My donkeys are moderately experienced with blacktop rural highways. In my part of Missouri there is a lot of slow moving vehicle traffic. Admittedly, not much of it is donkeys, but a combine in road speed isn't much faster than a trotting donkey.
And *way* harder to pass.

13. It's a bigger challenge to cross a lane of traffic than to arrange road practice where we can just turn right, turn right, turn right, turn right, be back at home.
The deal about donkeys is, if they don't like a situation they stop. And look it over.

14. I really don't want them stopping when we're crosswise to a 55 mph blacktop highway. So I have to have more confidence that they're comfortable with what we're doing.
But one step does not demand another, and they were happy to be out, and Bandit was chained to concrete,

15. So we went up the gravel road at a walk. I was riding, sitting on the cushioned tool box strapped to our 2 wheel work cart. Big ol' SMV triangle on the back, big ol' me sitting up there, two donkeys ambling comfortably down the lane.
It's a mile to blacktop. Peaceful journey.

16. People with cars (trucks, personal vehicles) respond differently to us.
This is not a part of Missouri where animal powered transportation is commonly seen. 60 miles northeast, yes, but not here.
Today on the gravel road a fella came up behind us in a big white pickup -

17. Slim, gray-haired fella, and he slowed *way* down.
We can hear a vehicle coming - well, I can hear you for a half a mile. The donks heard you start your truck.
So, he slowed way down. I wave people around.
Vehicles running along beside them bug them worse than passing.

18. So I rather urgently waved him ahead when he got close, and he went on. Later he came back from wherever he'd gone in his three tons of steel, and passed us going back the other way. That was the only person who passed us on gravel, in a mile, walking.
Christmas Eve day.

19. When we got up to C highway we stopped and let some traffic go by, then left turn onto C, trot up, I think it's about a quarter mile, stop sign, 10 highway. Gas station on the left corner, Roger's drive a few yards off to our right. Three cars coming. Lots of variables.

20. All the traffic in both directions cleared, and I could see two pickups, Roger's and another, gee - trot up, trot trot, haw, trot on, walk on, walk, and we're going up Roger's drive.
A goat with a paper label in its mouth sticks its head out the open machine shed door.

21. And both pickup truck doors open, and out step two brothers and one grown son, three of my favorite people in the world, and I'm sitting behind my donkeys on my work cart, and it was fun.
I tied the girls up to Roger's trailer hitch, and they weren't going anywhere, and we

22. Had us an old fashioned Missouri visit. They gave me their sympathy, but my friends, she was so miserable that the end was mercy for all of us. Her death was release. She was horribly miserable. She is free. I mourned her suffering worse than I do her passing. She is free.

23. After a while the eldest brother said he needed to be going, and I untied my girls, stepped up on the cart, sat... "Back. Back - perfect. Gee. Walk on." And we headed down the drive.
We were about halfway down by the time he got the pickup started and turned around, so I gave

24. Haw - off the drive into mowed yard - turned back, sat in an approach posture politely while the truck went by, Walk up, and towards home.

25. We had to wait at the foot of the drive for a small string of cars, then right turn, down the road, and...
There's motorcycles in the gas station, nasty little mechanical zip bugs, and Clara gave'em the eye, but they were courteous, turned & moved back away. Good folks.

26. Cos that's the left turn back onto C highway, and I really don't need Clara freezing up halfway across.
But it all went well.
We trotted all the way home, blacktop and gravel. I want to get them boots. Plan to. Need Sydney's help.
Great day. She is free. Give thanks.