"You're never ready-it's just your turn." That's what we told Merle when the dentist had to come. He had arrived with a broken tooth, and we danced back and forth with the adoption barn until in the end, it was our turn.

The dentist arrived with the vet to tranquilize him. Merle took one shot and was gone. You couldn't get near him after that. So on the next visit, the vet eventually corralled him into one of the run-ins where Merle performed a passo doble, dodging and circling the vet, trying to give him a kick, while taking an occasional shot in return, until he was too dozy to resist.

Then, the process began, turning out to be two teeth, It was a long procedure, with instrument after instrument inserted into his mouth, long pliers and pincers, sounding more like automotive repair than dentistry. There was tapping, pulling, re-inserting, tapping and pulling some more, until the teeth were finally loose. Then it was over, and Merle stood there dumbfounded. We hoped this would be like childbirth in the 1950s, that he wouldn’t remember. He staggered around like a dazed boxer, feet spread with his head hanging down low. He’d taken so much tranquilizer and had still tried to resist during the procedure. Eventually, he came to, and strolled out into the paddock and started eating hay.

Mules are hearty, sturdy and stoic. We didn’t know how long Merle had gone with broken teeth, but we were sure he must have been miserable. Steven Pressfield (the War of Art) once wrote, “The Marine Corps teaches you how to be miserable. Marines love to be miserable.”

Mules are the Marines of the equine world.