Goodbye Ginger.

Rest In Peace sweet Ginger.

We lost our 6-year-old daughter’s sweet, gentle old mare Ginger over night. She came to us from difficult circumstances last spring and was the key in getting Evie comfortable riding again after a scare earlier in the year. She could be cranky with me and other horses but was a true blessing to Evie—always patient, always willing and never taking a wrong step while her young rider was aboard. It’s been a heartbreaking morning letting a little girl know that her “unicorn” was no longer with us.

I found Ginger dead next to the stock tank this morning and thank goodness, immediately recognized that she might have been electrocuted. I called the electric coop out (who arrived in 30 minutes, amazing people) and we found that not only was the ground wire in our breaker box loose, but the backup ground outside was off. The horse tank and the one next to it that I fill pig waters from both registered a full 120v. If I had not found Ginger dead, I could have been killed myself when I went to dip a bucket in that tank. I am retroactively terrified right now.

We had experienced some random GFI plugs tripping in last few weeks, which I attributed to maybe the new style tank heaters I was using maybe overloading and just moved outlets to try to compensate. But that was actually our first symptom of this deadly issue. The moral of this story and why I am choosing to share this family heartbreak is that don’t mess with electricity. If anything seems amiss, get it checked out right away. If I would have done that, we might have averted this tragedy.

If you can, keep Evie in your hearts. She is taking this very hard, it’s the first love she has been old enough to really feel the loss of.