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Miniscule blades of hay drifted through the air, mingling with dust motes. Sweat seeped through my skin. My muscles strained to lift, and I wiped my brow.

“We haven’t started unloading the hay wagon yet, and I’m already covered in sweat,” I said. The wisp of a breeze outside barely stirred through the barn.

Martina, Sandy, her husband, and I moved old hay bales aside to create space for our new hay delivery. I dreamed of windows in the barn, as I examined my sticky shirt. I lifted and moved a bale, and then turned to grab another.

“Lucy!” Martina screamed.

“What? Where?” I asked, frantic.

Martina lifted the little chicken from behind a hay bale, revealing a small, perfect, pink egg.

The chicken’s comb lay shriveled on her forehead, and she made no sound. She didn’t fight when I pulled her from Martina’s arms. We rushed to the tack room and I filled up containers with food and water. Lucy drank deeply, over and over.

I hugged Martina, and we grinned.

I bought three Americana Chicks.  The soft, fuzzy babies cuddled with me, squabbled, pecked, and generally remained cute. However, they grew up. The photo on the left is Swiftie (at the top, owned by Erika) Nugget (the brown chicken, owned by Jasmine) and Buster, the darker grey chicken (owned by Ethan and Johanthan.) I just couldn’t leave it at three. Those little baby chicks in the right photo are our new babies. We have Stripe (The wide-striped chicken, again, owned by Johathan and Ethan) and Gladiator (the tiniest Mille Fleur chicken, owned by Martina.) The other new chickens are still unclaimed, though Megan has first dibs on the new flock. Lucy is showing them about life at Firefly Farm. She lays an egg every day in the aisle of the barn, and sings her “egg song” after the deed is done. We currently have four lovely eggs from Lucy in the refrigerator. Her previous eggs (almost a dozen so far) have been delicious.

He whinnied, whipping his tail; his pricked ears listened for signs of life. I strode to his stall and smiled at him. For a moment he stilled, then cried out again.

His buttermilk body and seafoam-green eyes captured me instantly. This magnificent beast would, with my lovely mare, create the baby of my dreams. Mine.

I wrote a book at age 11 called “Pain in The Hoof.” For the author biography, I said, “She hopes someday to own her own horse farm.” Whenever someone would ask what I wanted to do with my life, I would say, “I want to train and breed horses.”

I have the horse farm. My first dream is a reality.

As for training and breeding, I train horses all the time. I listen to their needs and work with them. Then, I train people to listen to their horses and speak “horse.” There are far fewer horses in need of training than there are humans who need to listen.

The image of a frisky foal frolicking around the yard still appeals to me. I want that. I want a foal I bred for, that I have the final say from conception to birth to death. I don’t intend to breed repeatedly; nor do I want more than one foal at this time. I also don’t want to own a stallion that is used for breeding purposes. Stallions are hyper-intelligent. They know how to work a person. There are some people who are meant to work with stallions. I am not one of them. I’m uncomfortable with the idea of breeding one of my horses repeatedly. Many horses out there are in desperate need of a home. I thought about those horses long and hard before deciding to breed Melody.

The selfish part of me insists that if I want this experience, I should have it. And so I shall.

I don’t intend to sell Melody’s baby. This is MY baby. I plan to be there through all the life stages, whether it’s the ‘cranky-mare-with-backpain’ stage before birth, the ‘I’m a frisky foal and will break everything’ stage, or the ‘I’m older and need meds for my joints’ stage. I’m prepared to own this baby forever.

My husband and I bought the farm. I’ve trained and worked with many of the horses here. I’m breeding Melody this afternoon at 5pm.  It’s time to add “breeder” to my resumee.