I'm So Excited (And I Just Can't Hide It, Obviously)

Last night I dreamed I was going eventing. Sometimes dreams have meanings that are obscure and hard to find the reasoning behind. Sometimes there is no reason behind them except eating cheese right before bed- trust me, I speak from experience.  However, there was no great mystery behind this dream, I was undoubtedly excited to be riding that day after a three-month hiatus.

All day at work, however, I felt completely crappy: nausea, headache, chills, etc.  When I texted this to my fiance, he very sweetly replied, “You sound miserable.  You should take some sick leave and just go home and rest.”

Go home? If I left work then that would mean I wasn’t well enough to make my lesson that evening.

“I have a lesson tonight.  I took some naproxen and now my head feels much better,” I texted back.  Suddenly, in the face of not having my lesson, I wasn’t sick at all!

As you can tell, I was so ready to ride, nothing was going to stop me.  As I drove to the barn after work I felt such a sense of anticipation, of - as corny as it sounds- joy at the thought of being around the horses. Riding, grooming, just listening to them as they shifted in their stalls eating hay… I couldn’t wait. While it wasn’t exactly the same feeling I get when I visit my family halfway across the country, it was pretty close.

The intense, almost childlike excitement I was feeling served to remind me that horses and riding are what I love.  They make me feel whole.  Or, if you prefer modern cliches: I know that I’m living my best life when horses are involved.

So, even though when I got to my lesson, my fingers froze, my half-chaps wouldn’t zip all the way (But I’ve been working out regularly! waaaaaah!), my muscles didn’t work the way I wanted or I had to listen to my fellow students talk about the horses they’re leasing (don’t cry for me Argentina, I’m sure the decorations at my wedding will be well worth cutting back on lessons…..*sobs*)…. Even despite all these frustrating things, I couldn’t help but think:

at least I get to ride again.

It’s good to be back in the saddle (yet again).

Wedding Vs. A Horse

My fiance and I are planning a wedding sometime next year and I'm very pleased to be affirming our commitment formally in front of our friends.

Still, every now and then the old urge to window shop for horses online rises and I find myself looking at horses and thinking, "What if we used all this money that we're scrimping and saving for the wedding and bought a horse instead?"

I mean, our wedding budget could pay for this cutie here and we'd still have enough left over to cover his room and board for a couple of years.

A popular joke among equestrians is how our beloved horses practically devour our hard-earned money as food, how the ability to write a hefty check without wincing is almost as essential as keeping your heels down, and how we're all crazy to have such an expensive money that will absorb all the funds you can throw at it.

When you think about it though, what's crazier: spending a bunch of money on a celebration that only lasts one day, or spend that same amount of money buying and caring for a horse of my one's very own for years to come?

Hypothetically speaking, of course.*






*Unless you're reading this, sweetie and you completely agree with me.  In which case, I already have my checkbook handy :)

New Gloves Update

You're probably super excited to see that I have an update for my super riveting glove problem from my last post.  I mean, it is a pretty fascinating story...

Anyway,  to recap:

This was the state my gloves were in before I finally admitted defeat and ordered a new pair.  So, I ordered my new gloves, blindly guessing the size (my old gloves were out in my car, which was like, super far considering I was ensconced on the couch with a dog in my lap) and they just arrived!

I gotta say, despite guessing at my size, they fit....like a glove.

Aw YEAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

(Yeah, I went there. This is what my life is now: really bad puns about gloves)

I Think It's Time For New Gloves

Just a guess.....

I Love My Barn, But.... (WARNING: a bit medically gag-inducing)

I love my new barn a lot.  Great trainer, beautiful facility, close to where I live/work.... I mean, it's pretty much the tops.  There is one thing (sparkly pink unicorn saddle pads aside), however, that really gets my goat.  (Also, this place has goats.  Like I said, it's the tops).

The interesting thing is that I've never had this problem at any of the other barns I've been at, which makes me wonder.  Now, contrary to other barns I've belonged to, my typical riding outfit of jeans and an old t-shirt I don't mind getting sweat, horse snot and dirt on, stands out from the rest of the crowd.  What was normal at my previous places now makes me look like some kind token wrong-side-of-the-tracks kid.

So, I feel like it might have something to do with the fact that the clientele is a little different than what I'm used to, but it could be something completely different that has nothing to do with the stereotype I'm about to make. You see, there are a lot of young'uns at the barn and their moms all tend to arrive to pick them up wearing the same outfit: yoga pants and flip flops.

I've no problems with the yoga pants, I don't blame you for wanting to be comfortable, but flip flops? Flip flops for crying out loud!

Am I the only one who was taught never to wear open-toed shoes to a barn? Was that just a midwest thing because we only get three months out of the year to wear sandals and our pedicure game is just not up to par?

Every place I've ridden, you come to the barn you wear closed-toe shoes.  Every place.  Sure, if you weren't born into a horsey family you might not know that off the bat, but in my experience, parents and riders alike learned really quickly. 

Just a couple weeks ago, a gross photo of the mangled foot and toenail (I'm trying not to gag right now) of a horse person I know popped up in my facebook feed without warning (another pet peeve of mine-  I was eating lunch at the time btw) who had been caught in her wellies.  If you're a horse person, you've probably also seen the oft-shared photo of that foot that was practically all scraped  off (I can feel the bile rising in my throat) that I'm NOT going to share here (not even if you paid me in Ryan Goslings.).  NOBODY wants that to happen to them, nobody.

So, what gives? To make matters worse, these women often stand in high traffic areas talking to each other.  People who are inexperienced with unpredictable creatures + standing in a high-traffic area + flip flops just seems to = painful disaster waiting to happen.

 So far, I've never witnessed anyone say anything to these women to educate them.  I sort of feel like that's my trainer's position (and maybe she has spoken to them and they just don't care, to be fair I don't know) to educate them and I don't want to be that person, that nosy know-it-all with unasked for advice.  Still, the whole situation just makes me nervous.  

What do you think, is there a polite and non-bossy way to suggest they wear real shoes, or do I just shut up and mind my own dang business?  

P.S. I did try to avoid being too graphic, but I'm sorry if this post grossed you out.  I'll try not to do it again.

Sparkly Pink Unicorns

When I was a teenager and deep in the throes of my-very-own-horse-at-long-last bliss, I received as a Christmas present from my fake Uncle (don't try to tell me that you don't have "aunts" and "uncles" who aren't related to you, too) and former partner in the horse biz a set of fluffy polo wraps in a very bright robin's egg blue.   I adored them.  They were blue (my favorite color) and they were fun! 

But why, I wondered, had Uncle Alex chosen that particular shade of blue when my show colors were the same solemn navy and grey as my father's?

"Because he probably did it to annoy me," my father the equine-conservative answered.  Yes, I would like to introduce that phrase into your lexicon. Let's just diverge for a second.

 The equine-conservative is someone for whom rust breeches is a bold statement.  Their colors are never bright anything, but always one of the traditional hunter colors of navy, grey, maroon, and well, hunter. When riding after the hounds, the equine-conservative always carries a turkey sandwich in his or her sandwich case. Belts will always be worn, even if you're breeches fit just fine thank-you-very-much and even under a hunt coat where no one can possible see it (ask me how I know this).  And "bling" is a dirty word not to be uttered in polite company.

So, you can imagine that my fervent and repeated pleas to dress my horse in twinkle toes and some Sleazy Sleepwear fell upon deaf (if slightly horrified) ears. Eventually, I grew up like many children do.  That is to say, I became my father.

 Yes, that's right- I'm now an equine-conservative myself.  Well, mostly. Ask to see my belt now, Dad! *Proudly parades around in belt so heavily encrusted in bling it actually pulls breeches down instead of keeping them up*


But I digress.

I simply want you to understand where I've come from so that you'll better understand the predicament I'm in now.  Since I upended my life and move a thousand miles away, I've found a new barn and a new trainer and started riding again.  My new trainer really is great, so much so that I'm willing to ignore the fact that lessons are more than I wanted to spend and the barn is farther than I wanted to drive.  But there is one thing that's beginning to be a bit of a problem...

Of the equines in the school horse string, I would estimate that a mere 30% are over 14 hands and a slim 1% are over 16 hands.  Indeed, the majority of mounts for riding lessons are adorable fluffy ponies.  Their riders? Equally adorable little girls in jodhpurs and pigtails. Yes, I am a bit of an outlier. Thank you for noticing.

Let me share with you one more percentage: 50% of the communal square pads for lesson use have pink somewhere on them. Pink. Bright pink, pale pink, one even has- yes, you guessed it- sparkly pink unicorns adorning the border. I'm grimacing my best grouchy-old-lady frown just writing about it.  I am not an adorable little girl on a fluffy pony, I am a stodgy, traditional, 20-something equine-conservative gosh dangit!

So, each time I go to tack up my horse for a lesson, I feel like I'm playing saddle pad roulette.  Please, please, please let the green one, the black one or even the tattered white one be clean! I mutter under my breath making the long walk to the tack room.

So far, I've been pretty lucky, but I know one day my number will be up and I'll walk into that room, look on the shelf and staring back at me will be the cheerful smug eyes of the sparkly pink unicorns.  Oh, I'll look around frantically for any other saddle pad that might be hiding under a saddle or in locker, but none will be around.  And there I will be, a slightly round, 20-something equine-conservative on fluffy draft cross with a bright pink sparkly unicorn saddle pad.

I'm just not sure my very precarious dignity can take that kind of a hit. So, I've done what any sane mature adult would do..... I asked my mommy to send me a care package from home filled with my old saddle pads.

An Ongoing Lesson In Humility

As I mentioned, I've recently started riding after a nearly two-year hiatus. As I also mentioned, I have learned that it is a super-bad idea to take a nearly two-year hiatus from riding.

I started getting sore before my first riding lesson was over.  By the time I made it home I could hardly sit, let alone walk.  I'm not saying I ever had the greatest leg (my IHSA coach can attest to that), but now I have not even the shadowiest remains of leg. And I'm pathetically out of shape, like huffing and puffing after a couple laps around the ring out of shape. Also, my left ankle, which was weak and annoying before has now officially gone to crap.

Nothing works the way it used to. I know what I'm supposed to do, but my body doesn't cooperate and  It's incredibly infuriating to not be able to ride the way I know I can. I'm sure anyone who has ever tried to get back into riding after an extended absence can relate.

Adding another interesting layer is the fact that I've resumed my riding career with a new trainer. My new coach is great, she's very understanding about how life sometimes intervenes with our equine plans, but she's never seen me ride when I was in shape.  She only has my word that I've ridden for 18 years and showed etc.

Every time my leg flails around like an over-cooked noodle, or I miss a distance or botch a canter depart I almost feel like I need to say, "No really, I used to ride," or "I used to have a leg, I promise!" just to prove I'm not lying about my experience level.

But, those would only come off like excuses. It's an ongoing lesson in humility each time I ride. The only solution is to prove my abilities over time.  In the meantime my pride will just have to adjust.