I remember the cold before anything. It froze my already aching ankles and crept upward until even standing felt uncertain. I was so stiff I could not move enough to ease my legs, trapped by the metal stanchion in front of me. The halter on my face was old and hardened, like a knight’s armor locked too tight, pressing and pulling until my head would not turn the way I needed it to. The metal burned with cold. The air cut straight through me. I could not see clearly because the strain on my face held me fixed. My hind legs throbbed endlessly, carrying pain I had learned to endure, while I stood waiting, unable to lie down, unable to step away, listening to the night close in around me.

Around me were strangers, sounds clanging and sharp, bodies shifting in fear. I had one eye open to the world, and with it I searched. When I felt someone look back at me—not past me, not through me—I gathered everything I had left and called with that eye alone. Come. See me.

Before that night, life was work without end. My body was asked for more than it could give, and when it broke, it was ignored. Pain became normal. Infection settled where care should have been. My legs carried damage that time was never allowed to heal. I learned to move anyway. I learned to obey even when obedience hurt. When one eye went dark, nothing slowed. I was still expected to pull, to endure, to disappear inside the task. When I could no longer do that well enough, I was no longer useful. That is how I arrived at the end of usefulness, which felt very much like the end of life.

That night, I did not know what would happen next. I only knew I could not survive another beginning like the ones before. When the pressure finally released and the world shifted, I braced myself. But what came was quiet. Space. Food that stayed. Hands that moved slowly. In quarantine, my body was seen honestly for the first time. The damage in my legs was named. My blindness was accommodated, not punished. And there was another beside me—one who could not see on the opposite side from me. We fit together immediately. Where my vision ended, hers continued. Where hers faded, I filled in the rest. We stood close, learning the shape of safety together.

As time slowed, something else revealed itself inside me. Life. A steady presence growing quietly, asking my body to carry again—but this time, with care. The weight is real, and my legs feel it, but now there is support beneath me. Medical hands monitor what hurts. Rest is encouraged. I am never rushed. My companion watches over me constantly, her body angled protectively, as if she understands exactly what is at stake. We are two who have lost differently, and who now stand whole together.

Now my days are gentle. I am brushed. I am spoken to softly. I am allowed to stop. I like standing in the sun where I can feel warmth sink into my bones. I trust the footsteps I hear. I lean into familiar bodies. I rest my head near the one who guards me, and together we breathe through each hour. I am carrying life in a place where life is honored. I am Joyfull—spelled all the way through—and I remember everything. I remember pain, yes. But I also remember the moment someone saw me and did not turn away. That memory is what holds me now.