Anyone raised around animals can relate to the sinking drop in the pit of your stomach and the Ooooh Nooo! Not again! when you hear those dreaded words, "The cows are out!"  or "The horses are loose!" or "The bunnies aren't in their cage!"  or "The goats are in the garden!"

But I have to admit that I didn't quite know how to react when I heard the kids yelling, "Baby's on the porch!"....accompanied with this lazy cu-lop, cu-lop of hooves on wooden planks and a big horse face sporting a black fly-mask staring at me through the sliding-glass door. 

I've heard of ponies being rather curious animals and all, but c'mon! Really. This was the same animal who flat out refused to get in a trailer about this time last year....that pulled all sorts of contortions and sideways shenanigans and up-and-down maneuvers to avoid such tight, weird-sounding spaces. Admittedly, the porch isn't as claustrophobic and dark as a trailer. And granted, it wasn't during a hail storm either. But still, one's bound to ask:

Was she brutally tugged and pulled and wrangler lassoed up on the porch--perhaps kickin' and screamin' the whole way? No.

Was she politely invited up on the porch? No.

Was she coaxed or wheedled or bribed to come up on the porch? No, no, and again no!

So I guess this might just be common everyday horse behavior that I wasn't aware of and should've been expecting from day one--that just sorta got brushed aside in the pony instruction manual we received when we first unpackaged her. Heck, for all I know, a horse in the living room could be common horse behavior, too.

And was she a gracious enough guest upon her very unhurried exit to leave the porch as pristine clean as she found it? No, no, and again no!

If horses just naturally go on porches, shouldn't they just naturally know some porch etiquette? Where are all those horse whisperers out there when I need them? On the Horse TV Channel selling videos, that's where. There's a mess of  'em over there. I'm just not sure it's worth $165 and 38 seminars to answer my pony-porch dilemma...

So please don't be shocked when my youngest looking up at this picture--ever so nonchalantly--says, "There's where Baby went to du baff-woom."

Yep, she most certainly did! While my husband assumed 'carnival duty' as he so aptly put it.

So it now looks as though Babycakes is done with barn life. She's decided that she's movin' on up to the East Side on the north side--better known as our porch side. And I'm thoroughly convinced....beyond a shadow of a doubt...that if I happen to leave the sliding door open, I could easily end up with a very large pony in my living room!

Leave a Reply