On a lovely late afternoon, I drove up a tiny rural road in Lehi Utah looking for a story for my documentary class. My breath was taken away by the massive perfect trees out front of this home, so I gave it a knock.
A man answered. When I told him I had dropped a dime on a map, and the dime landed in this neighborhood, he told me I should do a story on the sister-wives across the street. "Them polygs would be far more interesting!"
He let me in, introduced me to his wife, and the stories unfolded. Olympian daughter, his wife wrote a book about adoption and her animals, currently using all of her animals as therapy and has plans to extend that to military members, so on and so on. After showing me the mantel where plastered paw prints of four of her deceased dogs were displayed in honor, I knew I had chosen the right home.
She did this "feeding" game with all of her horses.. She'd pull her face away and it would be covered in greenasty crap from the mouths of the horses. Didnt even phase her. The book she wrote correlates adoption with animals. She believes if you approach the topic of adoption with your adopted child, by using animals as an example, its the best way to explain to them that they matter. Just as we try to find the best home and care for our animals, the same is done with mothers who decide to give their babies a better home.
Leslie also did a whoooole lot of competing with her babies. (horses)
She works day in and day out for these animals. The sacrifices that she makes... its incredible the love she has for these creatures.
They spend THOUSANDS of dollars a month on hay.
Moral of the story is, get out of your boring day-to-day stuck-in-a-box routine and meet the humans around you.
That's incredible, Lexi! I'm sure she will be forever grateful for these photos!
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