I could write a book on the experience I've endured. Stories and trials and successes and failures can be drawn with ink on page after page of published papers. Just as Barthes discusses, my text is an ongoing activity; it never stops. So why then do I feel as though the book must be erased and started over every mistake? It doesn't stop, it only pauses, has an intermission, but the show must go on.
The obviously off-beat footsteps of my horses hooves as he stumbled out of the pasture instantly made me think of something terrible. I knew I messed up. My mistakes, my failures, I had obviously not learned from them. My text had not taught me, and I had not recorded the solution.
Everyone knows there are no three-legged horses. Four legs or die. Four legs or die. Four legs or die.
I could see the bone protruding out of his leg, and I knew what I had to do. All the memories, all of the preparation and reading and practicing couldn't prepare me for this moment.
I shook as I eventually found the vein in his neck for the medicine, and helped the thousand-pound animal lay to the ground. I cried and hugged him and told him, "I have learned from you always, and I will never forget you. We've flew over obstacles, learned together and failed together, and now you can rest in your pasture forever. Trails end, buddy."
The shot from the gun was my only choice. It rang in my ears and in my bones and I walked away knowing his story had ended, but it would be just a chapter in my book.
No comments:
Post a Comment