by a dear friend R.T.
At first it was a slice of semi-Heaven. Watching E lovingly drink in every little characteristic of the horse was to truly enjoy her daughter in a way she'd only longed for till now. But Laurie forced herself to reiterate what was at stake. Not to discourage E, but because she knew it was perhaps her daughter's last chance. "Remember, when school resumes, you'll only be able to come visit her if you've been at school the entire day. The entire day E'."
E didn't even glance at Laurie, "I know!" she said angrily, wanting to bring the subject to a permanent close.
And so it went for the rest of Spring Vacation until that fateful Monday. E grumbled in her typical manner, despising how early she'd had to get up. Laurie resisted mentioning the horse. It was powerful ammunition she wanted to use carefully, and so she watched and waited, wondering how the morning would play out. E went to school and stayed the whole day, but Laurie knew better than to count on this being a pattern. Once again E enjoyed the horse and all was well. Until morning.
Getting up earlier than usual once was one thing. Doing it twice was unbearable. And so E dug her heels in and refused to go to school. At all. Laurie took a deep breath then let it out slowly and easily. "Very well," was all she said. E was slightly alarmed at how easily Laurie gave in, but she chose to ignore the implications of what that might mean.
Hours later she arose, convinced that the day must be spent enjoying the horse. She went downstairs to find her mother finishing up in the kitchen. "Hi honey," her mother said. She didn't even sound angry. "I left some extra oatmeal in the pot for you. I'll be back in a few hours."
"Where are you going?" E asked. "I don't want to be here alone. Besides, I want to ride the horse."
"Sorry," said Laurie as she grabbed her keys. "You should have gone to school." And with that she left before E could summon up her wrath.
After a few hours of running errands and ignoring her cell phone, Laurie returned home to find E whipped up into a near-convulsive state of panic. "Where have you been!! The horse is sick!! She needs us to get over there now!!!"
Laurie sighed. She knew this had been coming, but the knowledge didn't make it any easier. "The horse is fine. If you wanted to see her you should have gone to school. Now move out of my way, this package is heavy." Laurie knew restating the facts wasn't necessary, but she said it clearly and resolved not to say it again. She was only going to put herself through so much.
E followed her, shouting out various crises, ills, and injuries the horse was suffering; never once acknowledging that the real crises was the once roiling in her gut. The sheer panic that for once, the thing at stake really mattered. The conflict of wanting to be with the horse, wanting to touch it, smell it, hear it's sounds, and the reality that it was her own actions that was preventing it from happening was almost too much to bear. No, it wouldn't do. Something would have to give, and that something was mom. With all the force and fury that E could muster, she directed her anxiety upon the weakest link between her and her horse, her mother. She would make Laurie's life so hellish, so unbearable, that a compromise would surely be formed on new terms. But little did she know how strong her mother's resolve was. Little did she know that Laurie had been praying, been preparing, been digging in her own heels for this fight.
"Never waver," had become Laurie's new mantra. Somewhere deep inside her, deeper than even E's fury could reach, Laurie had resolved that she would hold to one unmovable standard. School = horse. Period. There would be no compromise. There couldn't be. There were no more options left. The school had made that perfectly clear. No one else was going to provide the incentive. No one else was going to instill the fear. No one else was going to present the inspiration. No one else but this gentle, wise, motherly horse. This patient horse that somehow embodied every quality that E lacked. It stunned Laurie the way E seemed to draw from these qualities whenever she saw them together, and the purity of the relationship, the sheer caliber and perfection of the partnering demanded a new standard of cooperation that even Laurie couldn't bring herself to compromise. It was just too important. "Never waver". She said it to herself again and again.
And so she weathered what seemed to be the force of hell itself. E's panic took an endless variety of forms, always managing to avoid it's true form; that of a girl who's bluff has finally been called. The loss of control was literally sickening to E, and Laurie and Chad frequently felt real pain over the suffering of their daughter. Yet when it became too much, Laurie would escape the heat to go ride the horse and she'd feel her resolve emboldened by the instantaneous response of the beautiful animal. As if the horse were fully aware of the war that raged over her existence. She patiently waited while Laurie put her tack on, sympathetically listened as Laurie poured her heart out, and encouraged Laurie with her instantaneous responses to the most subtle gestures of control, giving Laurie a glimpse of the strengths and abilities that E would be privy to once the battle was won. She could only wonder what realizations E would collect as she finally worked with the horse.
Sensing the strength of Laurie's resolve, E changed tactics. She no longer cared. "The horse is stupid," she insisted. "I want a different horse," she declared. In some ways, E was speaking truthfully. The conflict of wanting something denied was best soothed by no longer wanting it. It had worked many times before, and for awhile it worked now. But every time E heard Laurie talk about the horse, praise it's nature, boast about it's responsiveness, a lump would form in E's throat that even beating on her brother couldn't satisfy.
Finally, after months of trying, it made its way into E's head. There was no other way. She had to attend school. Even worse. She had to get there on time! Oh, how E had strove to achieve a mere 3 minutes of compromise, the tiniest fraction of control within this hellish deal, but no. Her mother had remained firm. If E was not at her desk when the bell rang, the first bell, and the last, the horse would not be hers.
One thing was for certain, she would never admit, not even to herself, what it meant to see the school day through and be with the horse. To know that her standing before it was proof positive that she had survived the unpleasant, the uncomfortable, the insufferable. She had survived it and she had earned the pleasure of her horses presence. A presence made sweeter for the victory of having gotten through it. The confidence it instilled in her was imperceptible at first. Only the horse could sense such subtle shifts of nature. But by September, with a summer spent loving her best companion, and being frequently reminded by her parents that the battle would resume again and that they were prepared to see it through, E found herself mentally preparing herself for school in spite of her best efforts to deny it even existed.
That following year she was surprised that it was not so traumatic. Maybe it was because it was familiar this time. Maybe it was because her memory had exaggerated how awful it had been, but whatever it was, after a few weeks of retesting her parents resolve, (a battle sooner lost because she simply could not bear any extended time without her horse), E found herself keeping stride with the demands of the day. A young woman still uncomfortable with her world, but no longer at war with it.
Oh it started out normal enough. It's Tuesday so we are up early for Chad's paper route. He doesn't really have a paper route but he does deliver newspapers for some publisher on the island just because he is on this side going to that side. So they pay him to carry the papers over once a week. It's great. It pays for all the environmentally sound cleaners and deodorizers and repellents I purchased today anyway.
