The tele­phone rang. “Law offices. Oder.”

“Ken­ny, it’s Sue Ellen. You ain’t gonna believe what just hap­pened! Fred came to the break­fast table buck nekkid! Lar­ry and Grady were still in bed, thank you, Jesus! It’s a mir­a­cle they didn’t wake up and walk in the kitchen! Can you imag­ine the shock of my lit­tle boys seein’ their dad­dy nekkid as a jaybird?”

In her mid-twen­ties, short and slight with coal-black eyes and stringy brown hair, born-again Chris­t­ian, moth­er of two boys, and the unhap­py wife of a motor­cy­cle enthu­si­ast and ser­i­al sin­ner, Sue Ellen Defibaugh called me every day for three weeks. Each call went on for­ev­er; she rarely paused to take a breath; and I couldn’t jam a word in edgeways.

“Sue Ellen –”

“I told Fred to march right back in the bed­room and get dressed and he just sat at the table with his hands between his nekkid legs and his head hangin’ down and he start­ed cryin’ and he said Sue Ellen you gone crazy with Jesus and I can’t stand it and I want you to go back to the way you was and I said Jesus is my Lord and Sav­ior and you need to get straight with Him because I can’t live with a sin­ner who cuss­es and drinks whiskey and lis­tens to the devil’s music and comes to break­fast nekkid.”

Fred came to break­fast nekkid in the sum­mer of 1972. UVA had accept­ed my appli­ca­tion to law school the pre­vi­ous spring, and I gave notice to Albe­mar­le Coun­ty that I wouldn’t return in the fall for a fourth year of teach­ing high school. The news leaked out to my stu­dents. The father of one of them rec­om­mend­ed me to a Char­lottesville attor­ney, Richard Bell, who was look­ing for a sum­mer clerk. I sched­uled an interview.

Bell had con­vert­ed a two-sto­ry res­i­den­tial home on a tree-lined street near the cour­t­house into law offices. Five-feet-four with a round face, reced­ing chin, and lit­tle pot bel­ly, he sat at his desk in what was once a large par­lor and squint­ed at me through smudged, thick-lensed glasses.

“I haven’t even start­ed law school,” I told him. “I don’t know any­thing about the law.”

“I don’t care,” he said. “Your stu­dents say you’re a peo­ple per­son. I need a peo­ple per­son.” He hired me on the spot.

My first day on the job, Jody Sprouse, Bell’s office man­ag­er, a no-non­sense pit bull in her fifties with a bee-hive of blue hair, led me to a clos­et-sized win­dow­less room and plopped a stack of mani­la file fold­ers on a dusty desk jammed against the back wall. “Your job,” she said, “is to keep these peo­ple away from Mis­ter Bell.”

By the end of the day, I under­stood why Bell need­ed a peo­ple per­son. He made a small for­tune buy­ing run-down homes in dis­tressed neigh­bor­hoods and rent­ing them out to cov­er the mort­gage pay­ments. The bulk of his legal work involved these trans­ac­tions. While his acqui­si­tions cre­at­ed sub­stan­tial net worth, they didn’t gen­er­ate much cash flow, so he took on tra­di­tion­al legal work to pay the bills. And that was the rub. Social­ly inept, tac­i­turn, and sullen, he hat­ed client contact.

Bell’s three law clerks were no help to him on that score. They were each bril­liant UVA law stu­dents with the per­son­al­i­ty of a plas­tic bag. While they were great at legal research and doc­u­ment­ing com­plex trans­ac­tions, he couldn’t put them in a room with a client with­out los­ing the business.

That’s where I came in. The files Jody stacked on my desk spanned the spec­trum of a sole practitioner’s bread and but­ter – wills, trusts, con­tract dis­putes, debt col­lec­tion, divorce peti­tions. Each file con­tained Bell’s cryp­tic notes from an ini­tial client meet­ing and a list of infor­ma­tion he need­ed from them to com­plete their legal project.

My job was to meet with the clients, gath­er facts, fill in the blanks on form doc­u­ments, and hand them off to Bell for final revi­sion and court fil­ings. I made a hit with the clients right off the bat. Angry because they’d been neglect­ed, they imme­di­ate­ly warmed up when I told them their case was my top pri­or­i­ty. I was the peo­ple per­son; Bell was the lawyer; and every­thing went along smoothly.

Until one morn­ing in July. Jody buzzed me. “Sue Ellen Defibaugh on line 2.”

I dug out a thin file labeled Defibaugh v. Defibaugh, con­tain­ing a sin­gle page of pen­cil-scrib­bled phras­es. “Preg­nant at 16. Mar­ried 17. Sec­ond child 18. Hus­band won’t go to church.” Not much to go on, but by then I’d learned to dance with­out music. “Put her through,” I told Jody.

“Be care­ful. This woman’s crazy as a shit­house rat.”

When I intro­duced myself, Sue Ellen cheered. At a revival ser­vice my dad preached in Free Union, she’d answered his altar call to ded­i­cate her life to Christ. “Thank you, Jesus, for sendin’ me Rev­erend Oder’s son in my time of need!” She launched into a full-throat­ed con­dem­na­tion of Fred for pres­sur­ing her to stop play­ing “Jesus records.” The Black­wood Broth­ers, Jim­my Swag­gart, Jim­my Pat­ton, The Inspi­ra­tions. Even Elvis and Aretha Franklin got into the act. “I cry every time that girl sings Amazin’ Grace.” After an hour with­out a pause, she hung up because she had to go to the toilet.

For three weeks, Sue Ellen buried me in an avalanche of phone calls. Fred wouldn’t go to church, drank beer, took the Lord’s name in vain, blas­phemed, looked at dirty mag­a­zines, played pok­er with his bud­dies. Worst of all, he pestered Sue Ellen con­stant­ly about sex, but after my dad’s revival ser­vice, she’d refused to let him touch her. “It’s a sin to lie down with a man who don’t love our Lord and Savior!”

The nekkid break­fast came along in August, and it went bad in a hurry.

“When I told Fred to go back in the bed­room and pull on his pants, he stood up and said Sue Ellen I miss you so much and he just stood there cryin’ with big ole tears streamin’ down his face and he walked back in the bed­room real sad and I called you cause I want Mis­ter Bell to get him outa my life unless he stops his sin­nin’ ways–”

In the back­ground I heard shout­ing and glass breaking.

I sat up straight. “Sue Ellen?!!”

“Sweet Jesus! Fred threw a chair through the win­dow, jumped out, and drove off on his Harley. He ain’t wearin’ no shirt, but at least he put on his pants. I just don’t know what to do.” She broke down, sobbing.

Relieved Sue Ellen hadn’t been hurt, I let out a long breath.

“Oh no!” She gasped. “Lar­ry and Grady is up. Mer­ci­ful Jesus, please give me the brains to know what to tell my sweet babies.” The line clicked.

I placed the phone in its cra­dle and stared at it. Fred’s frus­tra­tion was build­ing. Some­thing bad could hap­pen any day now, and I didn’t know how to stop it.

As Jody and Bell had made abun­dant­ly clear, my job was to keep the clients away from him, espe­cial­ly the aggra­vat­ing ones, and Sue Ellen was among the most aggra­vat­ing clients God and my dad had ever called to the altar. But I was just a glad-hand­ing peo­ple guy. She need­ed a lawyer.

Know­ing I’d like­ly lose my job, I marched past a star­tled Jody into Bell’s office unannounced.

He looked up from a plat map and scowled. “What do you want?”

Jody stormed in behind me. “What do you think you’re doing? You can’t just barge in here—”

“I’m in over my head,” I said. “Sue Ellen Defibaugh’s safe­ty is at risk.” I recapped her 35 phone calls, con­clud­ing with the nekkid break­fast and the smashed-out window.

When I fin­ished, Bell stared at me silent­ly for a long time. I expect­ed the axe to fall at any moment.

Then Bell said, “Her hus­band called in here once. He told me he loved her. He cried. I felt sor­ry for him.” Bell put his hand to his reced­ing chin, looked out the win­dow, then looked at me. “The hus­band is unrep­re­sent­ed. Let’s call them in. I’ll meet with him while you meet with Mrs. Defibaugh. We’ll try to set­tle their differences.”

Her mouth hang­ing open, Jody looked like she might faint. I was shocked, too. The last thing either of us had expect­ed was for Bell to pro­pose meet­ing with a human being unre­lat­ed to his real estate business.

The next morn­ing, Jody led Fred, a tall, mus­cle-bound, skin­head in his 20’s, wear­ing a leather jack­et with a motor­cy­cle hel­met dan­gling from his hand, into Bell’s office.

I met with Sue Ellen in a con­fer­ence room down the hall. “Is there any way you and Fred can stay togeth­er?” I asked her.

Sweaty chest­nut-brown bangs stick­ing to her fore­head, dark cir­cles under her slight­ly crazed black eyes, she nod­ded eager­ly. “All I want is for Fred to give his life to Christ.”

“Sup­pose he won’t do that.”

“Then I want him gone.”

I tried to talk her off that hard line. She wouldn’t give an inch. I inter­rupt­ed Bell’s meet­ing with Fred and told them what she said. Fred asked to speak with Sue Ellen alone. She refused.

Bell met with Fred again while I wait­ed with Sue Ellen. Fred told Bell the nekkid break­fast was his des­per­ate attempt to res­ur­rect the wild sex­pot he’d fall­en in love with, and although it didn’t work, he still loved her. It took Bell more than an hour to con­vince him to let her go.

Fred agreed to move out that day before Sue Ellen got home. Sue Ellen and I watched him from the con­fer­ence room win­dow. Tears stream­ing down his stone-hard face, he put on his hel­met, strad­dled the Harley, and roared out of Bell’s park­ing lot.

“Good rid­dance,” Sue Ellen said, her eyes dry.

Lat­er that after­noon, Jody came to my office. “What did you do to Mis­ter Bell?” she said in a small voice.

“What do you mean?”

“When you were with Sue Ellen, he called me in his office to bring him a box a Kleenex. That big bald-head­ed boy was cryin’ like a baby and Mis­ter Bell was hug­gin’ him.” She took a deep breath. “And he had tears in his eyes. What did you do to him?”

“I didn’t do any­thing. I don’t under­stand it either.”

Over the next few weeks, Bell and I worked out a sep­a­ra­tion agree­ment between Sue Ellen and Fred, divid­ing their prop­er­ty and giv­ing him vis­i­ta­tion rights. Their divorce peti­tion was grant­ed the fol­low­ing summer.

I worked for Bell nights and week­ends through­out my law school days. Dur­ing that time, I came to under­stand him bet­ter. We were very dif­fer­ent peo­ple, but like-mind­ed in two ways: 1) after Defibaugh v. Defibaugh, we both vowed nev­er to come with­in a coun­try mile of anoth­er divorce case; and 2) although Bell worked hard to con­ceal it, he was a good peo­ple per­son. When it count­ed most, he lis­tened to his heart.

I first saw her in a pho­to­graph post­ed on a web­site about hors­es for sale in South­ern Cal­i­for­nia. I had bought a lit­tle sor­rel mare, Marge, and I was in the mar­ket for a sta­ble­mate when my train­er and good friend, Janet, saw an adver­tise­ment on the inter­net and sent me the link.

“Gray Azteca mare. 8 years old. Ranch/trail horse. Sound. Takes her leads. Good with chil­dren. Loca­tion: Lan­cast­er.” In the pho­to­graph, she stared at the cam­era with big, soul­ful eyes, her ears pricked for­ward, a dark gray fore­lock falling over her face. 

Janet arranged a meet­ing with the sell­er. Lan­cast­er, pop­u­la­tion 170,000, sits sev­en­ty miles north of Los Ange­les at the hub of the Ante­lope Val­ley in the Cal­i­for­nia High Desert. On a hot dry Sun­day after­noon, I pulled off a paved street into a res­i­den­tial neigh­bor­hood with sandy dirt roads and small Span­ish-style hous­es on wind-blown, dusty lots. 

I parked in front of a pale yel­low, tile-roofed home. A short guy in his late thir­ties wear­ing a cow­boy hat, jeans, and boots, stood on the front stoop. We talked while we wait­ed for Janet. His name was Miguel. He worked as a lead­man on an assem­bly line in one of the aero­space fac­to­ries that form the back­bone of Lancaster’s econ­o­my. He bought the horse from a friend when she was two years old. He didn’t have time to work with her any­more because he was busy coach­ing his sons’ Lit­tle League teams. He seemed like a nice guy, a good father try­ing to raise his kids right.

When Janet got there, we walked around behind the house. A sad­dled and bri­dled gray horse stood under a big shady ash tree next to a cor­ral. A chain hooked to her hal­ter and tied to a branch high above her head was pulled taut, forc­ing her to hold her head tilt­ed upward. Her big eyes watched us as we approached. The look in her eyes and the ten­sion in her stance made me uneasy. 

Miguel unhooked the chain and led the horse to the cor­ral. When he placed his foot in the stir­rup, she crow-hopped and pulled away. The nice guy I’d met on the front stoop dis­ap­peared to be replaced by a harsh tyrant, indif­fer­ent to the feel­ings of the horse. He yanked her reins bru­tal­ly and man­han­dled her to a stand­still to climb in the sad­dle. In the cor­ral, he forced her through short chop­py zig-zag pat­terns, jerk­ing her head rough­ly back and forth.

“You don’t need to do that!” Janet shout­ed. “We’re only look­ing for a trail horse.”

Pay­ing no heed to her, Miguel spurred the horse into a top-speed gal­lop to the corral’s far end, pulled back on her reins so sav­age­ly she sat down on her haunch­es and slid over the sand to come to a stop, then whipped her around, sprint­ed her back toward us, and vicious­ly mus­cled her into anoth­er sit-down stop, almost rip­ping her head off in the process.

It was hard to watch.

“You shouldn’t buy this horse,” Janet said to me while Miguel was still out of earshot. “He’s ruined her. She won’t be a safe ride.”

When Miguel dis­mount­ed and walked over to us, the nice guy returned. “So, what do you think?” he said, smil­ing amiably.

The split per­son­al­i­ty con­fused me at the time, but since then, I’ve met many horse­men like Miguel, nice peo­ple in most aspects of their lives, but with a blind spot about hors­es. They treat them like inan­i­mate tools with no thoughts, feel­ings, or emo­tions, like a trac­tor or some oth­er type of farm machin­ery. They expect hors­es to fol­low the dic­tates of their will with­out the slight­est devi­a­tion. When a horse resists, they beat her into sub­mis­sion, and when she can no longer per­form, they don’t hes­i­tate to put her down.

Miguel was such a per­son. I looked at the horse stand­ing behind him, her head down, trem­bling, blow­ing hard. I felt bad for her. “I’d like you to test ride her,” I said to Janet.

Janet gave me a dou­ble-take, but she did as I asked, and after­ward, when she inspect­ed the horse for sound­ness, she found that Miguel had bri­dled her with a spade bit. A spade bit has a wide flat plate that goes over the horse’s tongue and pro­trudes way up inside its mouth. A skilled rid­er can use it for max­i­mum con­trol with­out inflict­ing pain, but in Miguel’s hands it was an instru­ment of torture.

Janet explod­ed and bawled Miguel out. I thought he’d get mad, but his blind spot about hors­es left him puz­zled, rather than offend­ed. He shrugged off her anger and turned to me. “So how about it? Do you want to buy the horse?”

Janet took me aside. She feels even more strong­ly about hors­es than I do, but her job is to pro­tect me and my inter­ests. “He’s abused this horse,” she said. “She may have old injuries we can’t see that didn’t heal prop­er­ly, and she’s so fear­ful she won’t be a safe ride for you or your grandchildren.”

I looked over at the horse. Her soul­ful eyes stared back at me. Some­thing stirred inside my chest. I agreed with Janet’s assess­ment, but I couldn’t leave her there. “I’d pay dou­ble the ask­ing price,” I said, “just to get her away from this guy.”

I bought her. 

We named her Lily.

Janet was right about old injuries. There are deep scars on her legs. She favors her left shoul­der and walks with an incon­sis­tent gait. Janet thinks Miguel showed her in a char­rea­da, or Mex­i­can Rodeo. It’s com­prised of nine events, includ­ing the man­ganas, or horse trip­ping, where a rid­er on horse­back chas­es a horse around an are­na, las­soes her legs, and makes her trip and fall. 

Lily’s psy­cho­log­i­cal scars run deep, too. When she arrived in Hid­den Hills, she was afraid of me. She shrank from my raised hand and wouldn’t let me touch her. I kept try­ing, and after a few days, she calmed down enough to let me stroke her neck and rub her back.

On one of my vis­its with her, I found a small hard knot low on her shoul­der and anoth­er one high­er up. The vet found more of them under her tail. “She has melanoma,” he said. Melanoma tumors are com­mon among gray hors­es, he told me. Many of them live nor­mal lives with­out adverse effects, but the tumors can some­times be fatal, spread­ing to vital organs, swelling up, and burst­ing open. “There’s no cure,” he said, “but there’s a vac­cine that can slow the tumors’ growth. It’s expen­sive, and it often doesn’t work. Most peo­ple just ignore the con­di­tion and hope the horse out­lives it.”

We start­ed Lily on the vac­cine and sched­uled her for injec­tions every six months. 

Mean­while, Janet trained Lily in Hid­den Hills’ are­nas and on its trails to ease her fears and smooth out her skit­tish­ness. Six months passed before she gave me the green light to climb on Lily’s back, and even then, we had to be ponied off a calm, steady geld­ing for three more months before I could ride her independently.

After all the train­ing, she still gave me some good scares on solo rides. She calmed down over time and I feel safe now when I ride her, but I know fear was burned into her soul with a hot brand­ing iron leav­ing a scar that can’t ever heal entire­ly. So, I ride her with vig­i­lance and care, and I’ll nev­er put my grand­chil­dren on her back. 

Lily’s four­teen now. She’s been with me for six years. The vac­cine seems to have helped. Her tumors have grown, but not much, and they haven’t affect­ed her over­all health. Psy­cho­log­i­cal­ly, she’s much bet­ter. She accepts affec­tion and gives it in return. 

I love my hors­es and a lot of hors­es that aren’t mine. They all tug at my heart, but some­times Lily tugs a lit­tle hard­er. She still star­tles when I approach her too quick­ly or raise my hand too sud­den­ly. In those moments, she looks at me the way she did that first time I saw her tied to the tree in Miguel’s back­yard, and I know she still remem­bers Miguel, the char­rea­da, and the magnanas.

I wish I could purge the night­mares of Lily’s past from her mind, but I can not. All I can do is keep her safe. And when I see that fear­ful look in her eyes, I stay longer with her and touch her more gen­tly and try hard­er to make her feel what’s in my heart.

I wake up at 5 a.m. to feed the hors­es. Every day.

It start­ed dur­ing a hot spell. The mer­cury climbed into the 90’s by 10 each morn­ing, so we had to ride ear­ly to beat the heat. To give the hors­es time to eat their break­fast before we left the barn, they had to be fed by 6, but Mari­no, the man who feeds them for me, doesn’t show up until 8:30. My choic­es were to stay out of the sad­dle, force the hors­es to lug us around hun­gry and pissed off, or feed them myself.

It felt like I’d been asleep about ten min­utes when my iPhone’s night owl ring­tone woke me that first morn­ing. I crawled out of bed in the dark, dressed, and stag­gered down­stairs to the truck.

I stall five hors­es in two barns, which I named Olive and Her­bert for short­hand ref­er­ence. Olive is locat­ed across Long Val­ley Road from the Hid­den Hills Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­ter, a two-minute dri­ve from my house. Dawn broke as I parked in the lot next to the center’s swim­ming pool. A slim elder­ly woman wear­ing black gog­gles swam laps in a lane marked with a float­ing blue and red rope line. Grog­gy from the ear­ly rise, I sat comatose in the truck, watch­ing her slide through the water, slow and steady, up and back.

A shrill neigh broke the trance. Across the street, Jack­son, Lily, and Dol­ly stood in their turn-out cor­rals star­ing at my truck with their ears pricked for­ward, won­der­ing what Car­rot Man was doing there at 5:30. They watched me intent­ly as I climbed out of the truck and walked through the gate. When I head­ed to their stalls with an arm­load of hay, they began to cel­e­brate, pranc­ing and toss­ing their heads.

Jack­son is a sol­id chest­nut with a white blaze on his face and three white socks. He’s smart, well-trained, and a pro­fes­sion­al, reli­able ride. A big, beau­ti­ful paint with a white face and white splotch­es on her body, Dol­ly lives up to the name on her reg­is­tra­tion papers, ShesATotalDiva.

Drawn to Lily that morn­ing, I stood at her stall door and watched her eat. A gray flea-bit­ten (black speck­les) Azteca mare with a pret­ty mane and lush white tail, she bears deep phys­i­cal and psy­cho­log­i­cal scars from her pre­vi­ous owner’s abuse. Because of injuries that didn’t heal right, she favors her left shoul­der and strug­gles on down­hill grades.

Lily raised her head and looked at me. She was afraid of me when I bought her. Now, her soul­ful eyes look at me with hard-won trust and a touch of love. All my hors­es tug at my heart, but some­times, like that morn­ing, Lily tugs a lit­tle harder.

I pulled myself away from Lily and drove to Her­bert. It sits on a hill­top a cou­ple hun­dred yards from Olive. Marge and Wil­son stood at the fence beside the road and watched Car­rot Man’s truck climb the steep dri­ve­way to the barn. When I opened the door to the feed room, they real­ized why I was there and gal­loped up the hill to their stalls.

Wil­son is a bay thor­ough­bred in his twen­ties, a good soul who tries his best to do what­ev­er you ask of him. I retired him from rid­ing when arthri­tis attacked his spine. In Jan­u­ary prob­lems with his front hooves got so bad I thought I’d have to put him down, but he res­cued me from that heart­break­ing deci­sion, mirac­u­lous­ly fight­ing his way back to good health under the care of a smart, inno­v­a­tive vet. I’ve writ­ten often in these pages about my friend­ship with Wil­son. See Rid­ing Wil­son, Stay with Me, and For the Love of Hors­es.

Wilson’s sta­ble­mate, Marge, is a lit­tle sor­rel quar­ter horse mare, perky, mis­chie­vous, and fun­ny. Despite her size, she tries to dom­i­nate oth­er hors­es, for­ev­er lay­ing back her ears and bar­ing her teeth at them, but her aggres­sive­ness doesn’t car­ry over to peo­ple. She loves my grand­chil­dren. And Car­rot Man, when he remem­bers to bring the carrots.

In the coop behind Her­bert, the roost­er crowed a greet­ing to the sun­rise and tall pines cast long blue shad­ows across my path as I walked back to the truck to go home.

The ride went well that day, and the ear­ly rise put me to sleep at 9 that night, which made the next morning’s 5 a.m. ring­tone less jarring.

I fed the hors­es every morn­ing dur­ing the hot spell. The morn­ing after it sub­sided, I didn’t set the alarm, but my body clock woke me at 5 any­way. I lay in the dark star­ing at moon-shad­ows, think­ing about the hors­es. Their body clocks had adjust­ed to the ear­ly feed­ing, too, I thought. They’d be dis­ap­point­ed when I didn’t show up. It didn’t sit well with me. I got up and drove to the barns. The next morn­ing, I fed them again. And the next.

Weeks passed. Sep­tem­ber brought short­er days. It remained pitch dark all the way through the feed­ing. I had to car­ry a flash­light to find the hay. The morn­ings grew cold in Octo­ber. I donned a heavy coat, gloves, and a muffler.

Six months into it now, my morn­ings have tak­en on a con­sis­tent rhythm. I rise at 5 and climb in the truck. My head­lights wash over Pedro feed­ing Tom­my and Zig­gy in a cor­ral on Round Mead­ow. He grins and waves to the crazy old man who feeds his own hors­es. I wave back. Steam ris­es from the heat­ed pool at the com­mu­ni­ty cen­ter. The gray-haired swim­ming lady slides through the water, up and back. She glances at me through her gog­gles and rais­es an arm mid-stroke in greet­ing. I tip my hat. I cross the street to the haystack. Jack­son nick­ers. Lily and Dol­ly prance. Manuel walks a tall roan down Long Val­ley Road in the moon­light. “Good morn­ing!” he shouts. I shout back. Marge and Wil­son stam­pede up the hill to Her­bert, plumes of vapor jet­ting from their nos­trils. The roost­er crows. I walk through pine-shad­ows to the truck and dri­ve home.

I nev­er miss a morn­ing. Even in the bit­ter cold, rain, or high winds, and once dur­ing a rare thun­der­storm, I feed the hors­es. I don’t have to do it. I still pay Mari­no for the ear­ly feed, but I don’t let him do his job. Some­times, espe­cial­ly on those rough weath­er days or when I’m not feel­ing well, I won­der why I’m out there.

Part of the rea­son may be a throw­back to my youth. When I was a teenag­er in White Hall, I helped a friend spread hay in the field for his cat­tle before dawn on cold win­ter morn­ings. He drove a truck pulling a trail­er into the pas­ture. A hun­dred cat­tle lum­bered toward us, low­ing, a dust­ing of snow rid­ing their backs, the lead cow, Horn, in front, the oth­ers string­ing out behind her. I stood in the trail­er-bed kick­ing hay­bales off the back end. One by one the cat­tle dropped out of line to feed. Some­thing about it – the low­ing cat­tle, the dis­ci­pline of the work, the seren­i­ty of the cold snowy dawn – cen­tered me and eased my ado­les­cent inse­cu­ri­ties, at least while I was there. The ghost of that old feel­ing some­times swirls around me before dawn at Her­bert and Olive.

Anoth­er rea­son I’m there may be a need to feel use­ful. In big law and big busi­ness, I worked long hours con­fronting myr­i­ad chal­lenges. Retire­ment was like drop­ping out of exis­tence. Sud­den­ly, no one need­ed me to do any­thing. I was lost for a while. I found a pur­pose in writ­ing, but it’s a soli­tary voca­tion. You live inside your head; you work because you want to; and no one real­ly needs you to tell your sto­ries. The hors­es need me. They depend on me to show up, and they’re glad to see me when I arrive.

Susan, who boards two paints in a barn off Round Mead­ow and the only oth­er own­er I know who feeds her own hors­es before dawn in Hid­den Hills, offered anoth­er rea­son. “It’s qui­et ear­ly in the morn­ing when no one’s around. It’s the best time to bond with your horses.”

These things all play a role in my ear­ly morn­ing reg­i­men, I guess, but I tend to over­think things. Cindy usu­al­ly cuts to the chase.

“I don’t under­stand why I get up every morn­ing to feed the hors­es,” I told her. “It’s Marino’s job. It makes no sense for me to do it.”

“It makes per­fect sense,” she said. “You love the hors­es. It makes you hap­py to start your day with them. That’s why you do it.”

I would nev­er have pre­dict­ed I’d be ris­ing at dawn every day with­out fail in my 76^th year to feed hors­es, but this is where I find myself today, and my auburn-haired blind date is right about why. I’m in a good place; it’s where I want to be; and it makes me happy.