Lawrence Marsh
July 01, 2021 10:13 AM
The Smell of Relaxation [Advanced] by Lawrence Marsh
The smell of the back end of the animals filled his nostrils as hay crunched under his foot. Though he’d tried many different potions, spells and wards, he simply could not get a barn to smell like anything but a barn. Maybe barns held some kind of older, deeper magic, and thus would always smelled a certain way and any animal that lived in them took on the smell. It made a bit of sense, Lawrence always felt like he smelled a bit worse for wear for a few days after having to spend a good deal of time inside, of which he’d been spending a bit since a few foals had been born this year to the great beasts that pulled the wagons to school.And since the animals would eventually also be pulling wagons, it was important for them to be socialized with children, but not young children, not yet. Many animals, like dogs and horses, feed off the energy of the person near or on them. Thus today's lesson. Lawrence walked up to one of the mares who’d had triplets, and had been the focus of much of Lawrence’s time. He knew that the mare wouldn’t fully understand what he said, but he also knew that the mare would react to his voice and his emotional state. It was always difficult to not anthropomorphize animals, especially ones you woke up for at all hours of the day.
“Morning Empyrean. I promise that the pupils will treat your fouls gently and I will be sure no harm comes to them or the pupils. If you’d like, please relax, I’ll get you some fresh oats.” With that the horse walked to the back of her stall and laid down. It looked like she was starting a well earned nap as students began to enter.
“Good morning class. I Know some of you are studying for your end of school tests, so I thought I’d give you all something more relaxing to do here in the stables,” Lawrence took an exaggerated breath in wafting his hand up to his nose. Since he’d come to Sonora and embraced his new role as teacher, he’d learned that he could sometimes be overly dramatic in his teaching performance. Something he wasn’t upset by.
“Smells like relaxation.” He gave his Advanced students a big smile.
“Instead of the papers and reading I’ve been giving you of late, we will be doing some hands-on work. As you may know, our school was venerated with five new winged foals this year. As I begin to prepare them for their life of pulling the school wagons and relaxing on the grounds, they need to both, be socialized to students such as yourself, and to be taken care of. Now, can someone tell me the difference between socialization and training?”
Lawrence called on a student.
“Correct, socialization of animals is basically the process of training animals so that they can be kept in close relationship to humans, other animals and in specific environments. Horses are all herd animals so we’ll be socializing them to people with other horses nearby. These horses are only nine weeks old, so they are in the prime time to be socialized with humans. You’ll each choose a horse with a group or by yourself. Your job today is to take the horse out of the stall, walk it around the enclosed area attached to the back of the barn, groom the horse,” Lawrence pointed to the brushes and hoof picks in one stall, “and then feed it. Each of these horses have yet to be named, so when you and your team are done, if you have an idea for one, please feel free to raise your hand and let me know. If you’ve never worked with horses, don’t worry about cleaning their hoofs, just brush them down. As always, I will be here if you have any questions.”
OOC: OOC:
Winged Horse info: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/wiki/Winged_horse
Basic Horse care for those who aren’t horse people: https://www.humanesociety.org/resources/horse-care-guidelines
https://www.aspca.org/pet-care/horse-care
If you want some history of horses:
https://aaep.org/horsehealth/equine-behavior-through-time
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Lawrence Marsh
The Smell of Relaxation [Advanced]
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