the Sage By Nature blog

So I wrote this article today…something to do with horse racing and animal injustices…and I am going to post a little of it here each day until I am done. Maybe it was Eight Belles speaking to me to write it for her, but whatever it was I felt compelled, so here goes:

“No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend’s or of thine own were. Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee…” John Donne
The great poet John Donne believed that we are all diminished when anyone dies, and I think that we are all diminished in some way by Eight Belles’ death. Or perhaps just every other living horse is affected since they are all connected to her in horse-kind, but one could argue that if a horse is affected then his owner is affected. When I read the story of Eight Belles’ last run, I felt the pangs of loss even though I had never known her, in fact had never even known of her. You see, I stay away from horse racing (and I cannot say that I follow any sport that involves the use of animals) ever since I went to a horse race several years ago – my first and last – and saw horses refusing to enter starting gates and being whipped through to the finish. I am just not one to stomach most of the things that I hear about, see and read when it comes to the use of animals, especially horse racing.