I have always had a fondness for mules, but unlike many folks my age, I never plowed with one. When I was young, mules were being replaced with tractors and while there were still quite a few around, not many were still working. I remember a man who would come through the neighborhood with a mule, and for a small fee, he would plow people’s gardens. My father also plowed his garden with a mule that he borrowed from a neighbor. This was before anyone had a tiller.

  There was a mule named Dolly that stayed in a pasture not too far from our house. As a child, I always enjoyed taking an apple and feeding it to her. I spent a good bit of time visiting with the mule. In fact, the first photograph I ever took was a picture of Dolly standing in her stall. By the time the old box camera snapped the picture, the mule had ducked down behind the door. I still have that photo and only I know that it is a picture of Dolly. Most think that it is a crooked, out of focus picture of an empty stall.

  In college we went on a field trip to a saw mill, where I watched a mule pull a cart loaded with lumber down some tracks. After getting the cart rolling, the mule would step aside and let the cart pass. The pole chain was long enough to let the cart pass the mule and coast to a stopping point on the track where the lumber would be unloaded. The mule would then side pass and line up with the opposite end of the cart. A man would then hook the chain to the other end of the cart and the mule would pull it back to the saw where it could be reloaded. This happened over and over and the amazing thing was that I never heard anyone say a word to the mule. It simply knew its job.

  When I was working in the cattle businesses, several pieces of land were purchased, cleared, fenced and pasture planted. On one of these farms there was an elderly gentleman and his wife living in one of the houses. They were allowed to stay so as not to disrupt their lives in their retirement years. The old man had worked on this farm most of his life. There was also an elderly mule that he cared for. The man told us stories of a time when he worked the farm and he reminisced of the time he and the mule had spent plowing the fields. We were fond of the man and the mule.

  One day, the thirty-five year old mule could no longer get up. I remember sitting in the doorway of the stall with the old man as the veterinarian sent the mule to a better life. We told stories, laughed and cried together as the old man lost his best friend. I have lost animals over the years that I was fond of, but I don’t think I have witnessed the toll that the loss of this mule had on the old man.

  A few short weeks later the man’s wife came down the driveway with her car horn blaring. We knew something must be wrong and went to meet her. The man had suffered a heart attack and although we tried to revive him, it was too late. I am sure that he and his mule were reunited and I look forward to seeing them again someday.