Goodbye Grizz

Growing up on a farm lends many opportunities to witness the circle of life.  It never gets easier to say goodbye to the animals we love. In fact, it gets harder as I hurt for my children in addition to myself.  Every year when we sell the calves, I hate the way those poor mamas cry when we take their babies away from them, and it's hard to listen to them bawling all over town as other farmers are doing the same thing. There were quite a few "pet" calves over the years that were bottle fed and friendly who didn't go down the road when it was time to sell because my tender hearted dad just couldn't see them go.  Unfortunately, because farmers depend on the paycheck in the fall, most of the calves have to go.  I still try to only think about the part where the calves are taken to a place where they are given lots of feed and are fat and happy but not what happens after that.  Even harder than saying goodbye to calves has been saying goodbye to dogs and horses.  I remember several cases when a dog or horse was injured and had to be put down and my dad would cry just as much as we did.

The hardest goodbye I've witnessed yet happened in the past couple days when we told Brandt that his gentle giant Grizz would be going to a new home.  He had x-rays a couple years ago and it was discovered that he has navicular bone disease, which is progressing despite corrective shoeing and occasional easy riding only.  Bryce explained to Brandt that we needed to send Grizz somewhere where his feet can be taken care of so he can't hurt anymore.  Jason was going to help Bryce take Grizz to his new owner this morning, so last night the kids went out to spend some time with him.  Buddy asked me to bring my camera out and take pictures of him saying goodbye to his special friend so he could always remember him.  That little boy has had some special moments with Grizz, and it was almost more than I could handle watching them together for the last time.  Brandt then had the idea to cut some of Grizz's mane to keep, so I braided a small section of it and then cut it for him.  There were a lot of tears shed, and I'm sure it won't be the last of them.  By the end, though, Grizz kept nudging buddy and Kylie and loving on buddy like he always does, and had both kids giggling and happy.