Best Mates

As a child growing up on a small vineyard/mixed farm in rural Australia, my best friends were usually the animals that followed me around on a daily basis.

I remember my first dog was a stray that wandered in and stayed. He was a littly pug nosed animal with traits of about five different breeds.

My grandparents lived on the farm next door and bred purebred golden labradoors. My long time best mate Ding can be seen on the right in this picture. She was the result of my little hobo getting in with my grandmother's prize winning labradoor! Because my little dog had been killed on the road a few weeks before Ding's birth she was spared and given to me instead of being destroyed as a mistake.

Ding and I spent every day together, playing among the grape vines, climbing on to the shed roof, and eating almonds! Ding loved grapes and almonds.



My other best mate was one of my horses Midnight. I bought him at a horse sale for thirty dollars. He had been bucket reared as an orphan and was a scrawny little colt that had been destined for the dog meat buyer.
We had a love/hate relationship in which Midnight loved to be a pet but hated to be ridden. In the first few years of our relationship I spent as much time being thrown to the ground as I did staying on his back. Everyone advised me to sell him but were mates and you don't sell your mate!
We eventually came to an arrangement and competed in showjumping and eventing with a little success.



Both my best mates passed away as old animals, still in my care. Ding died the night after my first date with my husband to be, and Midnight as a 27 year old, with his head cradled in my arms for the last few hours of his life.

The thing that made them both my best mates was the fact that they listened to all my ramblings, were with me as I dreamed of things to come, and never told me what I could or couldn't do. They were always there for me, I laughed with them and cried with them.