Admiral

Although there is no Tesco nearby. A real wilderness.

Terrible frost. Frost on grass and fields. My thermos won’t even last long.

Minute. Two minutes.
The trader closes the gangway.
The Admiral pounds his hooves.

I come closer. Uncertainly, because there are five tall guys climbing on the car.

They are surprised to notice us. We agreed to meet in the morning. We were late. Morning in the countryside is before the chickens.

“You overslept, didn’t you? And we dragged this beast in. I’ll take it out, but you give me the money. If not, I’m going to grind it,” says a ruddy-faced man in black rubber boots.
Completely emotionless.

$321.
The man laughs that he will give us a vent because the Admiral is a piece of shit.

Just to clarify. That’s not what he called him. It’s me. Nobody uses names here.

I look. I measure him with my eyes. He’s about 130 cm. He’s standing hunched in the corner of the car and glaring. I don’t know how they loaded him, but I can see him shaking and smashing into the wall. This tells the story of these thugs’ morning conquests – if ponies were dying of heart attacks from stress, Admiral would already be lying here.

I take a few photos.

I don’t want more, because I can hear his heart pounding from 2 meters away.

George Orwell once wrote that man is the only creature that consumes without producing. He doesn’t give milk, doesn’t lay eggs, is too weak to pull a plough, can’t run fast enough to catch rabbits. And yet he is the king of all animals.

I look around the frost-covered yard. All kings.

They stand, smoke pipes, chat in their muddy rubber boots and big hats. Most of them have already tipped a drink before they have eaten. This is not a working village. They only live off the animal trade. They can afford it.

So let’s get back to the Tesco topic.

Today there is a promotion for the terrified Admiral.

The second Black Friday of the school year.
We have to give $321.
As you can imagine, we have the end.

So that the kings do not deport him today, we have to give an advance.

Will you stand today on his behalf and rosh this company?

Just put on warm shoes and a hat, we will stand here together for a while.

But I promise you it’s worth it.

When you open the gangway and listen to this silence, you’ll hear the rhythmic heartbeat of a little pony and for the first time you’ll hear a heartbeat in the rhythm of hope.

But if you were tempted to look into his eyes – give it up.

Because if you don’t succeed today, you won’t forget that look for the rest of your life.