Two years this morning since I said goodbye to my beautiful boy.

Photo copyright Aji, 2019; all rights reserved.

Impossible to believe, but it's been two years this morning since I said goodbye to my beautiful boy.

Ice. The wild horse, the mustang with so very many names, and animated by so very many ancillary spirits. I still see him with them, in my mind's eye.

It breaks my heart to know that he's gone, and yet, we learned at the very end that it was always inevitable; by the time he found us, he was already sick, and never had a chance. His body tried to die on him a few months later, and yet his spirit was so strong, and mine so stubborn, that we brought him back to give him nearly a full four good years.

And he was happy.

All Ice ever wanted was a herd, a place to belong, fellow spirits to love. I'm glad that if nothing else, he could live out the days he had left to him, the years, actually, in just such a place. 

And so this morning at 10:30, before we left, I took cedar and tobacco and water out to his resting place. It's covered, at the moment, with a bank of wild sunflowers newly in bloom. It's fitting for a boy whose spirit was so sunny, all despite the abuse and abandonment he endured in the years before he found us and refused to leave. And I miss him every day.

But now he runs with Cree and Shade among the stars, across the bridge to the other world. And I think he's still happy.

We love you, Ice. And I'll ride you yet one day, my beautiful high-stepping mustang boy.

All content, including photos and text, are copyright Aji, 2019; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.