We woke up this morning to our first Simonless world, and I have to say it was strange and a bit empty. Lenore can come out into the pasture now (Simon tried to stomp her once or twice) and Red and Lenore both came over to sit on Simon’s grave. Vince put a stone marker on the grave when he covered Simon over. Fanny stood watch.

We missed Simon’s morning bray for sure, but Lulu and Fanny seemed both stoic and peaceful, I’m not sure they minded not having a man around again. Many people often tell me stories about animals grieving but I’ve never seen it. They move on, they are adaptable and accepting, much the way I seek to be. It is harder for humans to grieve the way animals do, because we know what death is, and they don’t really. They don’t, I believe, spend much time looking back or forward, they live very much in the moment.

Simon gave us one more gift when he died, it was a cold but dry day. This morning, snow and ice storms – it would have been so much  harder to get a vet here and to bury him in such a good and peaceful spot. Hauling him through the mud and ice would have been nearly impossible – the ground will freeze in a cold wave tonight. And I would have hated seeing him struggle and die in the ice.

Simon loved the shade of the apple tree, and he loved the apples as well. I’m grateful he is there. I’m thinking about Simon and the aftermath of his life, and I keep going back to compassion. In taking him in, I chose compassion over convenience, or even common sense.

Random House insisted I use the term “rescue” in the title of my book about Simon: “How A Rescue Donkey Taught Me The Meaning Of Compassion.” Rescue books sell and other animal books do not sell as well, generally. Many people are drawn more to the idea of rescue than they are to the care of animals, I fear.

Reluctantly, I agreed with my publisher. Writers rarely win arguments with corporate publishers. But I never thought of Simon as a “rescue” and I do not care for the term and never use it with my animals, even though half of the farm is inhabited by rescued animals – cats, chickens, donkeys, sheep, dogs.

Last week, five or six people came up to me at different times and told me about their dogs – this happens to me daily – and each one told me their dogs were abused. I always ask why they say that, and they give me reasons like this: the dog is afraid of moving lights, the dog is afraid of men with big sticks, the dog is shy around loud noises, the dog is afraid of trucks and buses.

There are so many reasons why dogs might behave that way – breeding, litter experience, issues with the mother, encounters with dogs and the outside world. Abuse is actually the least likely for most dogs.

The University of Pennsylvania and other veterinary institutions who study abuse say it occurs rarely, and far less frequently than animal owners and the media report and believe. Few people have reasons for seriously abusing their pets – dogs and cats in America are the most loved and coddled animals on the earth – although it does occur. I feel Simon was living testimony to the truth about abuse and what it really is when it does happen. He was starved, ill, riddle with sores and infections, rotten teeth and infected eyes. The animal rights people in New York City who accuse the carriage trade of abuse have no idea what it really is, they should have seen Simon when I met him.

And this is the problem with seeing animals through such a narrow prism, the carriage horses are in danger now of being pulled from their safe and healthy lives and sent out into the world of impoverished rescue farms and slaughterhouses because a tiny group of well-funded people think it is abuse for working animals to work. Abuse is a crime, not an opinion on Facebook, and Simon’s farmer was brought to justice.

Something in the life of contemporary Americans calls them to need to see animals as abused and piteous and dependent creatures. I think it makes us feel valued, worthy, even superior to other people.  We are a fragmented, tense and disconnected people in many ways, animals give us something to feel better about. Abuse is real, it is a crime, but I sometimes think it seems that every dog in America was abused, and I am always drawn to wonder why it is that people need to take ordinary animal behavior and transform it into narratives of human cruelty and mistreatment.

In a way, this is exploitive, we use animals to feel better about ourselves, and maybe that is not a bad thing. We no longer see them as partners, but as pathetic wards and helpless beings.  I don’t think it is good for animals to view them through such a narrow prism. Simon never made me feel that way, I am thankful to him for that.

I never saw Simon as piteous, I do not ever describe  him a an abused animal. He doesn’t know what that means, and does not need to be described in that way. That word makes humans feel good, not animals. Simon did not seek vengeance from the farmer who mistreated him, he did not think about lawsuits or retributions. We can learn much from him, and from the animal world.

So Simon gave me a lot to think about. Here on the farm, we are moving on, life and death are brothers and sisters, the twin engines of life. We accept both. I am grateful for every day of Simon’s life, and for the many lessons learned from him.

Simon loved people, despite his awful treatment at the hands of some, he was generous and loving to the very end. A few minutes before his death, I begged him to try and get up, just as I did when he first came to me and could not really stand up. I didn’t know if he even knew me at this point, but he did. He struggled to get on his feet, and had me crying like a baby as he did.

Simon was not a rescued animal, he was not an abused or piteous creature in my mind. He was strong, compassionate and independent, and perhaps that was his true legacy.