Maeve Birch Home

    Tag: Horses

    • Story Snippet: Thoughts on the Herd

      You ask how the horses are. I tell you they’re fine. I brushed Spruce. I was able to stand next to Red today. I speak in terns of progress. Activity. I haven’t told you how peaceful it felt as the cuddly one kept nodding asleep with his nose pressed into my jacket. I haven’t told…

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    • Traveling Around

      The book and I are on vacation this week, wandering through the Appalachian mountains again. I took along a few copies to drop off in various places. If you see my book in the wild, it may be that I left it in a coffee shop somewhere! It feels good to have some time off…

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    • The Freedom of Waiting

      We are paused in the doorway again, the tall nervous horse and I. I’ve pulled him through this opening before. Not this time. He widens his eyes and holds his breath, waiting for something to happen, since things always seem to happen in doorways. Instead, we wait. It’s seen as a sign of weakness, me…

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    • Story Snippets: Flora

      I barely mentioned Flora, the oldest mare at the rescue, in my memoir. Though I didn’t work with her often, Flora was a wonderful dark bay with a generally pleasant personality, aside from a few quirks. She had a terrible fear of clippers, whips, and fly masks, and grumpyness about picking her feet up. She…

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    • Guilt and Smoke

      The past two days have been full of wildfire smoke here on the east coast of the US. What at first seemed like a weird orange sunrise turned into an all-day warning to stay indoors and watch through closed windows as the neighborhood was enveloped in a thick haze. Horses, unfortunately, didn’t have the option…

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    • Ponderings

      Things have been really chaotic on all fronts this week, so this blog post may be a bit scattered. Things at work made me realize over again that not everyone is going to like me. Sometimes it’s not for any good reason. Just as I can clash with someone else’s personality, so they can clash…

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    • Old Paths

      Yesterday I was caught off guard by something I thought I had already worked through. It wasn’t a big thing, I just got unusually angry about a situation that shouldn’t have been a big deal. I had to go back and reevaluate why I was so stressed about it. The anger and fear had snuck…

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    • Nearing a Goal

      Exciting news for the book this month: sometime in May we will hit 100 sales of Standing in a Field With Horses!  It’s amazing to me that this independently published book with no initial audience now has almost a hundred readers. Thank you to everyone who has read it, shared it, and reviewed it on…

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    • Bits and Pieces

      I read a book the other day that was recommended to me by a horse group that I follow. It wasn’t something I would have picked up without a recommendation, but I was curious. The book had some things in it I didn’t agree with, but I also found things I hadn’t thought of in…

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    • “He’s Disrespecting You”

      I would like to return these phrases, I don’t want them anymore: Get after himShow her who’s bossDon’t let her get away with itHe’s testing youGive him a little ‘encouragement’Give her a tap/kickBe the leaderDon’t let him dominate youAsk, tell, demandMake her workHe’s trying to pull one over on youShe’s faking it to get out…

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