A wild pitch ends up being a home run.

BY COURTNEY S. DIEHL, DVM

WERNERIMAGES 2018/SHUTTERSTOCK

It hadn’t been a good day. I’d been yanked out the door at 6:30 a.m.for a dude ranch call and was almost there, an hour drive, when they called back and said I didn’t need to come after all. And it was too late to run home and get my travel mug of tea and some snacks for the road, so I was stuck starting my regular calls without breakfast or lunch. I still had not figured out how to charge for a call that dead-ended, so I knew I’d be eating the cost. Again.

My first scheduled call was supposed to be four dentals but turned out to be only one. And, real quick, could I just check teeth on eight other horses, all of whom were far away in adjoining fields.

This was always a process guaranteed to take far longer than “real quick” and also guaranteed to leave me covered in stinking green saliva, struggling with horses that I didn’t know. The woman at the barn assured me that the owners would call and schedule the dentals later, but I knew from experience that this was unlikely to happen, and that I would more than likely never get paid for the oral exams.