Just some food for thought. Most people like to complain how hard their work is. I am no exception. People are amazed at how a five foot one woman can shoe a draft horse but I've just gotten used to it. My muscles have been trained but I still get rather sore when I've had an unusually busy week. Yesterday I tried to help Ron on a project he was behind on. He is installing irrigation for a lady that has a few trees here, a few there and a few farther down the road. Her place is 70 acres and this involves a LOT of trenching. My jobs were to lay in the poly pipe and make sure it was not sitting on any sharp rock and to then bury it and reseed with grass. My God I was sore today! I think of myself as in very good shape and did not think I'd worked that hard yesterday compared to Ron but my body is telling me otherwise. My point is that when someone you care about has put in a rough day give them a little something special if you can. I walked a day in Ron's shoes and appreciate how tired he gets. Now I can't wait to try and get him to trim a horse's foot! muddy
Hard physical work is hard on our ever aging bodies. I was 48 when I started my pond building career and there were days when I wondered if I could keep going. Of course I did, just like you do and will next time you must. But shoeing a huge horse sounds a bit intimidating to me.
My parents are farmers and I am a light-weight compared to the hard work they have done all their lives. Don't know how they do it but they don't bat an eyelid. Amazing.
I've never put shoes on a horse Muddy but I've picked plenty of stones out of hooves - no easy matter if you have a skittish horse on your hands so I really admire the work you do. I don't think any of us really understands how hard anothers job can be until, like you, we do it for ourselves. I helped to unload a cart full of hay bales one summer and OMG did I ache the day after. I had pains where I didn't even know I had bits!!! The stablehands seemed so quick at tossing them down and carrying them to the barn that I thought I would rather do that than clean tack - BIG MISTAKE - and one I never repeated.
