I hope you can find joy in the daughter you are raising. It is beyond belief what people are capable of. I would never have expected people to even think of doing so much evil. You had the worst luck in the world in regards to a place to build your horse farm. Too bad you weren't in a community with neighbors who were also horse farmers. Those people are lucky enough to enjoy the beauty of horses near them, and think to act so monstrous.

A few years ago, I went back to school for a semester in a branch college about 30 miles south of my city. It was real rural down there. What do you think was a common business down that way? Breeding horses and growing hay and alfalfa. It was a long drive to school, but it was a joy to drive past the little ranches and see those horses. I would approach the college on small country roads where, if I pulled my car to the side, I could just about reach out and touch a horse who was near the property fence.

These weren't big ranches, just little horse farms. I was told that some of the people didn't make money off the horses, but raised them for the love of doing it. I used to wonder "How does a horse decide when to lie down?" I don't know anything about horses, and that made it fascinating to me. I would stop the car and roll down the window and try to talk to a horse that would be near the fence. Pretty white painted fences. And seeing hay for sale here and there.

How I wish you were in a community like that. I don't believe anyone does malicious stuff like that down in this place I'm telling you about. I am in a western state. I think there is such a tradition of horses and ranching here that people are naturally protective of that whole way of life. It sounds like there is no tradition among the people who have lived near you. No tradition of respect. They probably have no long history of their families being on that land, like is the case out here. It is a very sorrowful story that you've told, but there are things to be learned from it. I don't know these people - your neighbors - but they have no pride in themselves, or in the place where they live. Sadly, that is what they will pass down to their children.