Horse Butt Along the Road

What do you do when you are stuck behind a slow-moving vehicle for 30 miles? There’s a pick-up truck towing a horse trailer in front of you. A horse’s butt is sticking out of the back of the trailer, its tail partially hanging outside.

Stuck behind a horse trailer

There is no passing lane on the uphill when the truck is going SLOW. And when you would be able to pass, on the downhill, the truck picks up speed.

speeding downhill

But what’s the rush… you surrender and enjoy the slower drive. Provided you are not the driver but the passenger (as I was), you pull out your trusty camera from the back seat and take pictures of what you see along the road. All of the pictures were taken through the windshield, except for one shot from the passenger side window.

passing the trash dumpsters

Leaving the windy, wooded stretch behind….on the open road again. It’s good to see what’s ahead on a clear stretch of road. White-spotted bambis have been playing along the side of the road, not realizing the danger they are in. While I was busy taking pictures, we passed one that had become roadkill, poor thing.

open stretch of road

The farmers have been busy making hay but it has been rained on already over the last few days. I believe they can charge more for hay that has never gotten wet. But you do the best you can when the weather doesn’t cooperate with human plans.

hay bales in the field

Storm clouds are threatening again.

storm clouds

A large group of birds flies over the roadway. Is it possible they are gathering for their Southern migration already? That short panicky thought crosses my mind. I’ve already seen some leaves changing color…animals have been eating the ripe blackberries before I can get to them…I suspect we’ll have an early and cold winter ahead…again.

a cloud of birds

We pass farm houses, long fence lines, and a little country store.

white fence along the road

farmhouse along the road

country store

When we come to this little white chapel, I notice that the horse had flung the entire length of its tail outside the trailer. Before it had been kind of bunched up but now it was swinging happily in the breeze. I point it out to my husband; there’s something freeing about the horse’s tail hanging loose.

little white chapel

My husband commented that I would have to write a blogpost about “horse butt along the road” and we laughed. But here I am doing exactly that!

You never know what you’ll find along the road or on Beauty Along the Road, for that matter.
Sometimes, a roadtrip is just a roadtrip and at other times, it’s full of life’s metaphors.