Misty

The most recent addition to the family...

You can't see me.

Misty came by email.

She was in the care of Zippy's former owners who wrote saying... "One of my friends sent a very pretty mini mare to me to work with because she has a super high flight response and is just flat afraid of people.... You can talk to her and she will come up to grab food. If you catch her and have a halter on she will walk with you, but that is about it... So I wonder, since I know you love your horses, if you would like to take on a project horse? Ali is not for sale, but she is looking for a forever home... Ali needs somewhere that she could be appreciated for her beauty and treated with a lot of patience. Perhaps you would enjoy her and be able to help her." 

I didn't think it was a good idea to have another horse but that night I dreamt her name was Misty. In the morning I told my husband (you know the responsible one) about the email and the dream, he said "Well we better go meet her". He called, set up a time, and hooked the trailer to the truck to go for our visit.

It was July, 16th 2010, we let her guardians catch and load her in the trailer to bring her home. Before letting her out of the trailer, that was backed up to the gate, I removed her halter and set her free.

Little beauty queen has Zippy all showin off.

Well Misty has been everything we were told, she is "just flat afraid of people", in fact she is the most fearful animal I have ever met. The first day here she approached me, bit my hand, and was gone before I even knew what happened. I laughed and told her it was ok, she spun a circle and came back to just look at me. She is the first to notice and greet, but does not want to be touched. Always close by watching everything, but always at an arms length. I put no pressure or expectation on her, she can do what she wants.

Each step forward in our relationship has been about patience and listening. Allowing her to always be where she wants to be, opening gates when she looks at them, keeping the others away from her, asking her if she would like to return to the others in the paddock and listening when she says "no", has given her confidence and hopefully trust in me.

We are now to the point in our relationship where on a few occasions, after dark, she has wanted me to scratch her. She is very expressive with her lips, wiggling them on my shoulders and face, she looks long and deep into my eyes, she has even carefully licked my forehead and hair. It has taken three months to get here.