cat smackles

VALE JACK – “WICKED & DIVINE”

We never intended to end up so tied to each other, but our hearts became irrevocably bound regardless. We found mutual respect and a way to coexist, and you, ever so independent, so self-reliant, chose friendship. You didn’t need me, but you would always choose to be in my presence willingly. And I felt blessed to be in yours. I thought we had years of these moments left.

You’ve guided a number of your companions out of this life with a knowing that surpassed understanding. Only one who truly lived in the moment could possess such wisdom about death. I’m trusting them to return the favour and take care of you up there, as you shed the body you were born into this life with.

It never quite fitted you properly anyway, nor did life in the real world. You always danced between reality and some higher place, your inner brumby constantly bursting at the seams. I always knew that you would never shut down or withdraw if your mind or your body became inhospitable; it would only frustrate you. I think you believed that if you ran fast enough, you’d fly.

And now, you can – forever wicked, forever divine, forever free.

Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for all the kind words in the wake of Jack’s death. It was a decision I didn’t expect to be making for a long time, but he had indicated to me beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was time.

As some of my readers will recall, I requested a post mortem exam when I had to euthanise the young horse who inspired the words below. There were so many unanswered questions, and I knew that if what I could learn from him saved even one horse from suffering, it would be worthwhile. Little did I know the journey it would take me on over the following years.

Jack was always such an enigma. I could see the obvious problems, but there were parts of the puzzle that just didn’t fit, and gut feelings about certain issues that had no obvious explanations or precipitating factors.

Knowing what I would have to do and actually following it through were two entirely different things. I’ll be forever grateful to the small team who helped me and supported me, and treated Jack with such love and respect throughout the process.

I had felt I was losing Jack prematurely. I’d been worried for a while, but it was only in the last month that his problems overtook his quality of life. Seeing the true extent of everything he had been trying to mask (and doing so quite effectively much of the time), I finally understood…he had been holding on. He had fed me clues along the way, but waited patiently until the precise moment I would be ready to put all the pieces of the puzzle together with what he revealed.

Jack has been my teacher for years, and always had to have the last word. On the table, he became a professor…and in true Jacky style, he had an impressive final say. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry as I imagined his cheeky little nicker over my shoulder. It was as if he had handed me the answer booklet and said, ‘here you go, mum, you’ve earned it!’

There is a huge, Jacky-sized hole in my life now, but he has given me an important job to do – to share the gifts of knowledge he has provided.

The response to the first episode of the Foundations of Soundness video blog has been phenomenal, but somehow, this chaotically busy year has flown by without much opportunity for more of the promised episodes. But before I take you under Jack’s skin, I want to take you into his life and his mind. Below is a preview of the first “Teaching From The Other Side” episode featuring Jack – who will join his girlfriend, Jazz, among others, as their bones teach us all for many more lifetimes.

There have been lots of tears…but I am also in awe of the amazing, generous horse who came into my life all those years ago…and who chose to stay, against the odds, until I could carry on his legacy.

Thank you, to the teacher of a lifetime.