The Tunbridge Fair serves as the transition point of summer to fall in Central Vermont. Like everyone else, I look forward to it as a place to have fun and work at the same time. One of my jobs is to test horses and ponies at the pulls for performance enhancing drugs. This involves choosing one horse from a team that has just been in the midst of the competition and obtaining three tubes of blood for testing. Depending on the handlers' abilities, the horse can be easy to do or hugely uncooperative.
In 2015, the weather was perfect, which brought out many teams and spectators. In the afternoon class, there were so many teams in the competition that I had to test three different ones. The first team was easy, but the second team was one of the fights of my life. The owner had put in a new, extremely big horse with one of the smaller horses from the previous class. I have come to expect the handler to tell me that I would be better off testing another horse, so I thought nothing of it when the handler said I should choose the othere horse because this one did not like vets. It seemed pointless to test the other horse, which had already been tested in the previous class. There is no way you can back down in front of all the other teamsters and not do the horse you choose first.
However, as I approached the big gelding I questioned my decision. He swung his big head in my direction, while at the same time treading with his feet, bringing the steel shoes a bit too close to my boots for comfort. In this business, you have to read horses and I understood the warning. At the same time, all of the other teamsters and their friends were clearing out of our section of the ring, leaving only my daughter, Elise, the horse, handler, and myself. It seemed like one of those western movies where the street clears out before the big gunfight at the end.
Not to be deterred, I resolved to move forward slowly and calmly to see how it went. My daughter stuck with me. I could soon tell that what the handler was saying with his warning is that he was scared of the horse. He really could not be firm with the big guy. Therefore, my best chance was to wear the big horse down to a manageable level. For a while, I felt as if I was dancing with the horse as it stepped forwards and backwards in unison while I continued to touch his neck in the area where the needle had to go in. At least he was no longer trying to step on me.
Finally, the handler got him to stand still. Going slow, I started stroking his jugular groove where I wanted to place the needle. That also built up blood in the neck. I went for it, and the horse immediately swung his neck putting the needle on the ground. No problem, I started the stroking again. Things quieted down, so when I put the needle in, he stood there. At this point, there was no way I was going to let go of the neck, so I put the tube on the needle with one hand. It filled! However, in taking it off with one hand, it dropped on the ground. I did not let it bother me and I went right on to filling the second tube. My daughter was so careful and quiet getting down to reach between my legs to retrieve the first tube. Got the second tube filled without realizing she was down there because I was so focused on the neck of the horse. I did not want to break the spell. Next I filled the third tube and we were done!
To my amazement, the bystanders - which included a number of drivers from other teams - broke into applause. I never heard such a thing before. The driver of the team tied my patient to the rail and came over and shook my hand. He said I was the only person to have ever bled the horse outside of a stock where the horse could be tied.
I was glad to be done and appreciative of my daughter.
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