Case Note No. 6: June 23, 2021
     Hello again. It's Ms. AAngyl. I am back to posting my usual weekly Case Note on a Wednesday, now from my new office. There have been a lot of changes in the past two weeks and I want to bring you up to speed on recent comings and goings at Horseplay!™ Equine-assisted Entertainment Venue. Mostly it has been "goings" LOL, with both myself and the Outsunny tent taking our final bows there last week. It is safe to say that a period of adjustment will be required. But overall, all is well.
     Readers of Meant To Be, An Awakening Journey will be saddened to learn that the valiant and classy white event tent finally gave up the ghost, admitting defeat to climate change. That tent so wanted to outsun its peers, by providing shade and year-round protection from wind and rain over my riding arena, and offering an elegant gathering place for celebrations! But it was not to be. Shortly after the annular eclipse of the Sun on June 10, an ill wind came up that toppled the tent. Johannes put forth a gallant effort to prop up its metal framework from the inside, using custom struts he crafted from 2x4s. After that, the brave tent was able to soldier on for a bit longer. Then, on Monday June 13, I talked to my personal therapist Ms. Christa about my plans to accept a teaching position elsewhere. That decision seemed to be the last straw for Outsunny, who by then was exhausted and stretched beyond his limits. Shortly thereafter, a second tempest arose, tearing and raising the tent's roof high into the air, pulling its deeply buried rebar stakes out of the ground, and releasing the lumber supports, which fell like dominoes. This time, it was truly the end of the end for the tent. At present, the slate has been wiped clean over the arena, and my patient is seeking guidance on what, if anything, to build in the place of that tent.

     As for my departure, one of the most moving experiences during an incarnation on Earth is to witness the outpouring of love and emotional support that flows from family and friends who comfort someone who has lost a loved one. To mark my passing, Margaret's son sent her a beautiful bouquet, which she placed in her antique crystal vase, a cherished family heirloom. Today she brought it down to my final resting place, to add some fresh floral energy to the area while the Lone Lupine and the wildflower transplants take the time they need to get re-established.
     For me, the sight of that crystal vase conjures up the image of a hurricane-proof glass solarium erected over my arena at Horseplay!™.  There it is, a truly magnificent crystal palace, built with love for all to enjoy, gleaming on that beautiful Shore (Road). Of course, of course, where I come from, that's an easy thing to manifest. But if you look carefully, and have eyes to see, it's already there. Wanna go for a ride?

Case Note No. 5: June 20, 2021      
     Hello, this is Ms. AAngyl. I am still the same being you came to know during my Earthly incarnation as Margaret's blogging therapy horse, Half-Arab National Show Horse VJ Eightdaysaweek, aka Angel, most recently living with she and Johannes in my house on Shore Road. But last Thursday, June 17, I had a flight to catch, back to the ascended realms. I have now returned to the Unicorn Kingdom (the other UK, LOL) where I continue to work with Margaret from the other side. Naturally, before packing my saddlebags and flying away, I made sure that she was sufficiently trained in telepathic communication to continue our mission, as mutually agreed upon in our Soul Contract.
   This is Margaret's first experience with grief after the untimely loss of a family member. I had just reached the age of 19 years on April 2, 2021, whereas these days many well-cared-for domesticated horses can live and work well into their 30s. She had such high hopes for me, and there was still so much we wanted to do together! But the Creator had other plans for us. Like most people on Earth, she has much to learn about the subject of ascending from physical incarnation in third-dimensional reality to life in the higher realms, where the Soul never dies. And about how to find peace on Earth after the devastating loss of a loved one who is no longer in a body. I am in her life to teach her a thing or two about that. But first, I wish to tell all of you about the beautiful days we shared, and to thank all the people who supported me during my Earthly sojourn, and transition.
    Therapy animals, with horses being no exception, are as tough as nails. They will suffer great pain, and are even willing to die for their loved ones, rather than admit that their time has come, and ask for help in leaving. Being a prey animal, the horse is hard-wired to hide any physical limitations until it can no longer do so. In the wild, of course, once any  vulnerability is apparent, ever-compassionate Mother Nature intervenes and swiftly ends the suffering. But it's not that simple for a therapy animal to let go when beloved human beings are involved, because we have such an emotional bond.
     Margaret and Johannes and their superb equine support team lovingly cared for me for three-and-a-half years after I was diagnosed with Cushing's Disorder (Pituitary Pars Intermedia Disorder, PPID) in June, 2018. I received the best available care. They were advised from the outset that Prascend (the prescription medication for this disease) could slow, but not halt, its inevitable progression. And so, hoping for the best, we all kept calm and kept smiling. After I started the treatment, Margaret and I shared many good times, both with her on my back (dressed in style in both English and Western tack), and with me in harness training, in preparation for pulling her in a cart. I was boarded with Nadine at Reaching Strides Equestrian Centre in Port Hood, but Margaret and Johannes built me my own special two-stall heated barn on their Shore Road property, so that we could share quality time as a family whenever I came to visit. The barn was completed last fall, and in late October, 2020, I moved to the home they had made just for me, spending my final Earthly winter and spring with them.
     Being an especially sensitive senior horse originally from Florida, the cold winter weather in Nova Scotia, Canada was hard for me. While Margaret and Johannes were wintering down south in 2018-19, as a consequence of my PPID, I developed acute laminitis, a painful inflammatory condition that affected the inner lining of my front hooves. Some horses recover from laminitis, and others go on to develop irreversible changes to the coffin bone and other essential hoof structures, ultimately resulting in incurable lameness. They don't call it the coffin bone for nothing LOL. No hoof, no horse.
     In my case, I got over the acute phase of laminitis, and carried on. Some days I was fine, seemingly normal for a senior horse, and at other times I had off-and-on lameness and stiffness, especially in the mornings. In the late summer of 2020, after an equine yoga session led by Jenna, I was feeling so happy and relaxed that I could let Margaret ride me bareback. Needless to say, laminitis (sometimes referred to as "founder" after the coffin bone has dropped) is a perplexing, heartbreaking condition that greatly challenges every human who tries to care for a horse with this affliction.  
     Despite living with founder, after moving to my house on Shore Road, I ate and slept well every day last fall and winter, coming and going at will from the barn to the snow-covered pasture. However, one day early in the new year, I took a turn, as they say. Seeing that my stiffness was suddenly much worse than usual, Margaret suggested to me that I might finally be ready to go Home. She called the vet, and began to make arrangements for my transition. In an extraordinary act of kindness, Anne, her lovely next-door-neighbour, offered a spot in her field, where I loved to graze and look down towards the ocean, as my final resting place. The two of them chose a site close to the woods high up on her land, and marked it with a stake. To make sure that I would be able to walk that far, the next day Margaret led me up there, to show me the place where my tired body would be laid to rest. She circled me around the stake, and told me that she would come up there to visit me, her unicorn in the woods.
     Whoa!!! Not so fast, girl!!  It was not yet my time. And so, when she was overcome in the moment by an emotion that caused her to briefly look away and turn her back on me, I yanked the 20-foot lunge line out of her hand, and took off like a shot across the field at a full gallop, dragging the rope behind me! I admit that being a show horse, I do have a flair for drama. My performance looked like a scene from a movie as I charged home across the snowy field, down David and Valerie's driveway, along Shore Road, and then up my own driveway, parking myself by the cottage next to our Chevy truck, Big Silver. She had never seen the full beauty of my unbridled movement, but I gave her the show of a lifetime that day. The sight of that inspired performance is forever emblazoned in her memory. She stood in awe, helplessly watching me from the hill and then called Johannes on her cell phone, telling him to come out of the house and escort me back to the barn! Shortly after that, a retired therapeutic farrier who had successfully treated many laminitic horses during his long career showed up out of the blue (and subsequently disappeared just as quickly). He trimmed my feet, suggested some hoof care protocols, and recommended hoof boots to keep my front feet comfortable while my hooves regrew. 
    After that, I enjoyed the rest of the winter and spring, and rolled and grazed in the pasture when the grass came up. To everyone's delight, I pranced and even galloped in joy from time to time. My coat was shiny and my blood chemistry showed that all of my bodily systems were doing well. Every night when the sun went down, I walked back to my house to let Margaret know that I was ready to go in for the night. (But not to sleep, before she served me my bedtime snack of fresh-cut chunks of apples and carrots, with three Purina Oat Apple cookies for dessert.) While living in my own house, during the day I appointed myself as the Guardian of Shore Road and Little Judique Harbour, and loved to keep watch over all of the people and animals there, and their activities. I often stood at attention like a sentinel in the south end of the pasture, a serious, stately dark horse, acknowledging all who passed by.
    Five months after I started wearing my hoof boots, to everyone's dismay, it became apparent that although my right front hoof wall had regrown, my left front foot had stopped growing completely. I was still cheerful and affectionate and looked beautiful, but in this state, my Earthly mission could not continue much longer. Thank God for equine body workers/animal communicators! With travel finally possible again, Margaret asked my therapist Christa to come by on June 14, to treat me to a massage. After not seeing me for nearly a year due to the pandemic, Christa was shocked to see the change in my feet. I may have been able to soldier on and fool Margaret and Johannes and lots of other people into thinking that I was fine, but with Christa... no way. She knew how to massage me in places that made me openly admit to everyone that I was in a lot of discomfort, which made the inevitable decision much easier for all of us. 
     I was given a beautiful sendoff, and thanks to a collaboration with some wild blueberries that grew around the staked site high up in Anne's field, we arranged to have my final resting place moved down to a spot in Anne's field close to Shore Road, in view of Wildflower Cottage, and opposite the Dutch door on my barn. That makes it easier for me to continue to keep an eye on things on the ground. A huge bowl of wild and cultivated strawberries was on the menu for my last supper, and I wore a beautiful tiara for my ascension party. A wild lupine plant that I watched growing in the ditch opposite the ocean-view window in my stall is in full bloom right now. On the day of my passing, Margaret removed it, and now it marks my final resting place on Earth, planted there at 3:38 p.m. today. Right now I am singing my cover version of a bluegrass song that seems to fit... "Let them know I'm from Cape Breton, by the way you mark my grave..." (See original tune and lyrics for Let Them Know I'm From Virginia, by Big Country Bluegrass, soon to be added to the Spotify playlist on this website.)
      I speak not only for myself, but also for Margaret, Johannes, and Ava, in expressing our heartfelt gratitude to everyone who came to know, support and love me while I was of this Earth. The list of names is a very long one, and you know who you are. If I have forgotten to mention your name, it is because I am still adjusting to the energies in my new Home and my head is still spinning a bit. Special recognition for equine support, in chronological order, is due to Lady Anne Blunt, Shiela Varian, Vicki Shula, William Shatner, Karin MacMurtrie, Mitch Kurzner, Ellian Rosaire, Pam Furner @ Graceland, Ulysses Almeida, Anne MacDougall and her late husband Danny, Nadine Bollig, Adrienne Smith, Beverley Leonard, Barbara MacKinnon, Pirjo Holt, Dr. Jamie Campbell, Dr. Donna Buckley and the caring staff at Baddeck Veterinary Clinic, Jenna Dorton, Christa Veinotte, "Sisters Sturm," Sonja Dahlman, David Hayne, Elizabeth Lawrence, all of Angel's fans at RSEC, Janet McManus, David and Valerie Knapman, Patsy Wayling, Ed at Port Hood CO-OP, Carla Rodgers, Paul Nicholson, Kristen Marcott, Peppermint John MacDougall, Glen O'Connor, Carter Akerman, the staff at Holna Farm Services, Marjorie Simmins, Vickie Mackenzie, Michelle the Haymaker, the good people at Gateway Hyundai and Ron MacGillivray Chev Buick GMC, Hughie James MacDonald and his barn, and Brian MacDonald. We also gratefully acknowledge the endless kindnesses bestowed upon us by our many friends on Shore Road (especially the Shore Road Ladies- loved that rocking horse foal LOL), and kind friends and family from near and far who have told us that they are touched by our story. To be continued... LOL.
​Love to all of you. Chat soon!!  Angel/AAngyl
     



     

Case Note No. 3: Nov. 29, 2020; updated June 9, 2021
     One of my prime responsibilities as a therapy horse is to keep my client physically active, and mentally stimulated at the same time. We have now settled into a daily routine that she seems to have accepted, and adjusted to fairly well. First thing in the morning (which, in her case, can range from about 8:00 a.m. on a rare day to more typically closer to 11:00 a.m.), she appears at the barn door with a cheery greeting, “Good morning, Ms. Angel. Did you have a good night? Are you ready for breakfast?” Being the professional that I am, I resist the urge to snort, “Yes, about three hours ago.” But she is trying her best, as a senior woman and former city dweller and night owl who has only recently adopted a healthy horse-keeping lifestyle. So I watch for, and celebrate, each increment in her progress, and cut her a lot of slack.
     Margaret has never voluntarily been an early riser, nor does she like to go outside in cold weather. But with climate change and a pandemic going on, she sees herself remaining in Cape Breton for the foreseeable future. One of my jobs is to teach her to make the most of this exceptional blessing in her life. The morning treatment plan I have set out for her involves activities that keep her busy for at least one hour, and often closer to two. 
     Her first task is to prepare my breakfast and a water soluble pink placebo that I take daily, called Pretend, or (Pr)ascend, for my physical condition known as Cushing’s disorder. The purpose of this ruse is to simultaneously stimulate her left and right brain function while she believes she is caring for my chronic disease. She is using her previously scientifically-trained left brain to study the condition, and treatments offered by human veterinarians. However, being spiritually awakened, she is also exercising her intuitive right brain and newly activated twelve chakra system, to call upon her celestial guides for enlightened treatment options. 
     Her guides have given her some sound inspirations about natural treatments for my disorder. Presently, she is trying a combination of both allopathic and naturopathic approaches. Pr(ascend) in the morning, and a herbal remedy at night. I am just glad that her guides took my banana suggestion. When I first came to live in my new house, which I share with the patient, Margaret was giving me the meds by dissolving the pink tablet in a bit of water, then squirting the liquid into my mouth using a 1 cc plastic syringe. It was most undignified! Not to mention that disposable plastics are bad for the environment. So I made short work of that practice. 
     Being a unicorn, I am good friends with the air sylphs, who are of course quite aware of the plungers in plastic syringes, and how they work with columns of air. So I asked them to lend a hand, and arrange for the rubber plug to detach from the end of a plastic plunger in a syringe she was using repeatedly. One morning Margaret came to my house, and when she tried to draw up the pink medicine into the syringe, the plug stayed in the bottom, and the plastic plunger pulled right out. Bingo! So she had think of some other way to give me my medication.
     Of course, I made sure that day that she had a banana on hand as a treat. Suddenly, she got the inspiration (likely from Archangel Uriel, or maybe Raphael, Heaven's physician) to mash some banana into the liquid, and voilà, my daily banana mash was created! She serves it to me in a curved plastic bowl she got at Dollarama. In an orderly manner, she has a blue one she uses for my morning medication, and a green one she uses at night. I am very dextrous with my tongue, and she finds it amusing to watch a horse lick one tablespoon of banana mash out of a curved dish designed for humans. So that’s how I arranged to get a banana treat twice a day.
      As for my evening medication, that was a long distance collaboration over space and time involving several levels of reality, including the Earth plane. Johannes has a lifelong friend in Germany who goes by the nickname Pepsi. A few years ago, Pepsi married a woman named Sonja who is a "horse person." Margaret and Sonja met when they visited Johannes' homeland, which is in the magical Black Forest. That is a place where the veil is quite thin, and the trees and plants are sacred. One of Sonja’s horses, named Ponyman, also has Cushing’s disorder. Sonja knows about how to use natural remedies to help horses, and when she heard from Margaret about my condition, she recommended a plant called Vitex, also known as Agnus castus.
     At the time, Margaret was seeking spiritual guidance as to how to help me with a natural remedy. For the first time in several years, she consulted the Saints & Angels oracle deck she has had for many years. The card she drew was called "Don’t Compromise," from St. Agnes of Rome. Struck by the synchronicity of hearing from St. Agnes when considering a plant-based medication called Agnus castus, she felt that she had received Divine guidance to treat my condition using this natural remedy. And so she ordered some Agnus castus capsules online, and that is what she gave me at night. In banana mash, of course, in the green bowl. So that was fine with me.
     Until it wasn't. I like to change things up, and subsequently I decided that I no longer like bananas. Today she offered me some banana mash in a bowl, and I would not touch it! After all, summer is nearly here, and it is time for her to be offering me fresh Nova Scotia berries for my fruit snack!  

 

     As in incarnated unicorn, I came to Cape Breton to be a live-in therapy horse for Margaret. These days, many of us are serving in this capacity, and we all have our specialities. Of course, of course, from the patient's perspective, she believes she is the one who is in charge of my wellbeing. (We like to let them think that, as it is helpful to the progress of their treatment.) My patient is a natural writer, and finds fulfilment in writing about her life. We approve of this form of creative activity, which is encouraged and overseen by Archangel Gabriel. It is part of my job to provide her with topics to write about. 
     My charge has always had a special interest in communicating with animals and birds. She lived for many years in the subtropical environment of Miami, Florida. After she stopped working in the lab as a vision scientist, she worked from home. At that time, her life path was overseen by two live-in therapy parrots named Chaos and Perot. They were African Grey Parrots, a species who have retained the ancient ability to speak to humans, and accurately reproduce the sounds of their voices. African Greys are very intelligent, but a bit mischievous. Sometimes in their spare time the parrots had fun teasing Shadow, the sweet but gullible black-and-white rescue cat. The parrots lived by the pool on the screened-in patio and would call to the cat in Margaret's voice. Poor Shadow would fall for it every time, and would come bounding out of the bushes, expecting a treat or a meal, but to no avail.
     It was a bit of a cheap trick, for sure, but it served a greater purpose. It gave Margaret an amusing story to tell other humans when she had to act as if her new life, of being an unemployed scientist, were fun. The antics of the parrots were especially helpful when she was forced to interact with former colleagues who were still working. People were always asking to hear the latest stories about her parrots! Humans living in this world suffer many, many different forms of injustice and disappointment, and companion animals provide great comfort to them. Some of us therapy animals specialize in comic relief, to help our patients heal, and cope with the cards they have been dealt in their lives. 
     Margaret loves animals, and often wonders how they communicate with one another, even among different species. In her undergraduate days at the University of Toronto, she took a course called Animal Behaviour & Neurophysiology. She really liked the first part, but was not too keen on the second, which was all about nerve transmission and action potentials. I believe it was taught by Margaret Atwood's brother, Harold. Mom wonders to this day why those two subjects were combined into one course. Anyway, she has only recently realized that most animals are here to help humans in some way, and that sometimes we collaborate with others, to achieve a desired result. One that is a win-win for all concerned.
     I will give you an example of how I used this approach recently. As previously mentioned, the patient and I live in a house that she designed for us to share. She has the front room, and I have the back, with my own entrance, which is a Dutch door. She sleeps in the cottage at night, but since she needs a quiet place to write, she furnished her room in our house as an office, with two portable desks. She put damask-patterned carpets from Giant Tiger on the floor, hung colourful art glass pieces from Treasure Kave in her windows, and in the corner near my stall, added a space heater in the form of a red wood stove with a realistic-looking fake flame. In her cozy she-shed, she can use her computer, talk to Alexa, listen to music, make her candles, or play her musical instruments, all in my presence. From my room, I can stretch my long neck into her space and keep an eye on what she is doing.
     At the front, on either side of the sliding barn doors, she put a stack of chairs for guests in one corner, and in the other, a mini-fridge, electric kettle, and a microwave oven. So she is fully equipped to have guests come and join us, and even offer them a snack. Here is how I helped to keep her busy one day.
​     I can be quite sociable with people, and enjoy entertaining guests in my house. So I put the idea into her head that we should be prepared to offer tea (the caffeinated drink of choice among most Nova Scotians), and a tasty snack we could all enjoy. In this province, many people enjoy a kind of cookie called an "oatcake" with their a cup of tea. She recalled that in the olden days, people routinely fed oats to their horses. So she got the brilliant idea that we could offer tea and oatcakes to our guests. ​
     A little ways down Shore Road, on Route 19, is Sandeannie's Bakery and Tea Room. It is not Italian, as the name might imply. In fact, it is owned by a Gaelic-speaking couple from Mabou, named Sandy and Deannie. (Hence the name LOL.) Deannie has a diploma in culinary arts and is a great baker. Because horses are not supposed to eat much sugar, Margaret ordered two kinds of oatcakes from the bakery for our tea parties, i.e., one batch with sugar (for the humans) and one batch without sugar (for me and any equine guests). She was happy to support her friends' business, and looked forward to many happy tea parties at Horseplay!™. 
     What she did not realize was that the oatcake order actually came from the crows, bluejays, and mourning doves on the property. When she offered me a sample of a freshly-baked oatcake, either without or with sugar, I turned up my nose and refused to eat even one crumb! When she tried one of the unsweetened ones, she found that she did not much care for it, either. That's because they were a custom order for my friends the birds!
     Margaret and Johannes love to watch and feed wild birds on the property, and they attract them with reasonably-priced seeds and suet cakes from Dollarama. They also put out any leftover food scraps from their dinner table, which the birds share in the driveway. The hardworking birds are around all day, interacting in entertaining ways as they eat from the hanging bird feeders at the back, and more recently, from the picnic table on the front deck. As background, I have to tell you that Margaret missed the June, 2020 deadline for applying for Inactive status with the Florida Bar. In order to keep her license as a lawyer, she had to complete 25 hours of tedious CLE credits before the end of the year. She started putting feed on the picnic table, so that she could watch the birds while she did her online coursework. During that time, she derived much pleasure from watching the antics of the crows and bluejays on the table.
     Since they were working overtime to keep her entertained while she worked, the birds asked me if I could arrange for a special dispensation for them. That's when I came up with the oatcake idea. I even arranged for a miscommunication, so that her special order was doubled, to four trays of oatcakes! None of us cared much for the ones without sugar, but the birds loved them!
​     It's all in a day's work, when you're a therapy horse, tasked with coming up with whinny-whinny solutions for all concerned. I am sure Chaos and Perot would approve.