The Donkey, The Snake, and The B1 Vitamin Treat

Did you see the donkey yet? Kristin asked.

Yeah, he’s right over there. We pointed.

The guy with the donkey wanted to talk, but Sally the Donkey didn’t want anything to do with our goats. Sharkey even went up to say hello and Sally’s heart just about fell to her ankles with fear.

Sophie scooted us along, how she does.

We went a different way. We wound around, gradually down. The bushes were higher. The trail was more narrow.

I wanted to go up more, Sophie said.

When we came to a fork in the trail, we chose up. Straight up. Breath busting, calf busting, butt busting Up. The goats all stuck their tongues out and panted. We panted too. We all took some breaks. Sophie grinned and caught her hat as the wind blew it around, happy as could be.

She looked so spiffy in her blue dress with long sleeves and her blue leggings and her purple backpack with that big old smile on her face. She’d cut her green hair and she forgot her glasses, so her eyes were a large shock of color against her pale skin. Her cheeks rosy from the sun.

So happy, climbing up that big old hill.

We got to the top. Way, way far up to the top. Where we could see everything. The goats all took a break and when we tried to move on, we discovered that the trail turned into a motorcycle track, so we turned around and headed downhill.

A rattlesnake rattled and I looked up. He was small, and the small ones are the most dangerous. I had no idea what the goats would do. Would they trample him? Would they think he was a stick? Would they get too close and get bitten? Would they ignore him? Would they stampede and run over Sophie like usual?

Snake. I said. Snake!

So Sophie and I led the goats way the hell around that snake and then back to the trail. Jon Snow threw himself down on the trail, all dramatic-like, going downhill. Several times. We started to wonder if he just didn’t like going downhill since he just had a physical and he was fine…at any rate, he’d get up after about five minutes, walk for another five and need another break.

Maybe he just needed more conditioning.

Maybe his head just wasn’t in the game.

And then we made it home rather uneventfully.

Which delighted us and we grinned a lot and everyone got a B1 vitamin treat.