Freeing Clyde

Last week Pam broke the news that, since she hasn't been able to use Clyde in lessons for a couple of months, and since his cough is not clearing up, she could no longer keep him on working livery rates and the charge for keeping him would triple :(

This threw us into a panicky depression, and a night was spent feverishly searching the 'net for Retirement Home for Horses in the Cotwolds - without any luck at all. I got up early the next day and spent more time on the 'net, with just two (almost) affordable options resulting - one near Oxford, one in Devon.

Something then made me pick up the phone and call Emma at Wood Stanway, just five minutes away - starting, ridiculously, to cry when she told me she could take Clyde, immediately, and keep him on grass at a price even pauper-Pony-Girl can afford.

For a very long time Jay has yearned to see Clyde with more outdoor time, a Free Clyde, indeed, and certainly living in a field with other horses and beautiful scenery all around seems more of a life for a good horse than one lived mainly in a stable or a school. Kindly Pam boxed up Clyde and drove him there for us the very next day - and the picture shows the moment when we set him free in his new life, possibly in the loveliest place in the world.

Summertime Clyde

Here's our lovely boy, enjoying a graze in hand.

Poor old Cloots is still coughing and at the moment there seems no likelihood he will return to 'work' any time soon. Very sad. He seems very well in himself however, bolshy , bumptious and as greedy for Napples as ever.

Pony-Girl is home from Oxford and will be looking after him tenderly for some weeks.

June 2009

Here's our Cloots today, looking every bit as handsome as when we last saw him. He certainly looks in better nick than, say, RPD, who informed me today he thinks he may have 'a mild case of Swine Flu', the symptoms of which are apparently 'a slight sore throat' and 'a very bad ankle'.

Poor Pony-girl is suffering, stuck in Oxford away from her beloved pony, taking exams and condemned to extra weeks away from home this summer doing a 'project'. She is not happy about this - but she is resigned to doing all it takes to get her degree so she can Free Cloots from his life of drudgery and buy him a fresh green field for his retirement.

I''ve been busy turning Cloots' story into a book. It's taken me rather longer than I hoped.