Let me see if I got this story straight. Some of the wild horses wandered into town, and actually stayed there for about a week. They were eating grass in the schoolyard, and in the park, and if there wasn't trouble with a passing car or maybe a kid walking home from school, there would be soon enough.
But then someone came along and shot them, all four of them. Shot them, and left their dead bodies where they were, for someone else to clean up. I didn't hear much about this; it wasn't on the news, and a lot of people felt that something bad was going to happen anyway.
But then someone went and shot two more, out on a country road. Like it's open season. It's like, if no one is going to get mad about this, might as well shoot them whenever we see them. Now as far as I know they don't do this with the deer or elk, though they could; they could probably pop a few out on a country road and who would know any better? But in this case, again, they left the bodies there for someone else to clean up. That someone, I would imagine, is probably a little annoyed by now.
It could be that the problem was, we weren't mad enough about it, the first time they did it. People just shrugged. Nobody called the newspaper. It seemed like they were going to hurt someone anyway.
I will give you my solutions. I will be the first to admit I am not from around here and am not quite sure what to do. But I can tell you, the horses are beautiful, and they don't deserve to be assassinated.
1. Get out the fire department. Next time they are in town, make a lot of noise in their faces. Make sure they know their life will be miserable if they hang around in town. Anywhere else is ok; we drive carefully anyway. Just don't let them nuzzle up on the schoolchildren.
2. Get the state involved. The state can actually find them a better place to live, if this area has become too crowded for them. The state has the resources to round a few of them up, and take them to a place where there's fewer people. Of course, Sierra Blanca is kind of out of the picture at the moment. But there are plenty of other places.
3. Get the National Forest to create a refuge for them. This they might actually do. Just an agreed-upon acreage, where it is marked perhaps with signs, and where we all know there are a lot of horses in here. All up against the reservation or wherever they are coming from.
4. Tell the world. Now this, I'm sure, is not your favorite. If you had New York City filmmakers out here interviewing the locals, they would make us look bad. To them, wild horses are the coolest thing on earth. To us, we're shrugging our shoulders when a few of them get shot. It's a difference in perception. You don't want those guys coming around, pick from #1-3 fast. This is our problem, so let's solve it. These horses can live in our world; in fact we want them to. They're good for us. They're beautiful. And they're free, as long as we leave them that way. Let's make sure they stay away from the village schoolchildren though, ok?
5. Do some policing. It probably is possible to figure out who's going around murdering horses. It's undoubtedly someone who is more than well-armed, eager to use his gun, and thinking if it's ok with him and his friends, it's ok. NO IT'S NOT. Murder is never ok. Hunting might be ok, if you eat them. Just murdering them is not.
I have given myself away; I love them, and don't want to see them murdered. I like the elk and deer too even though it means I have to drive very carefully every minute. To me it's worth it. It's what makes the mountains special.
