bad-asses amoungst us

Admittedly, I used to ride (and train) with some seriously renowned folks, but it's been a few years (*cough*) since I've been actively training in anything resembling that capacity.  That's not to say that the people who I've worked with, or for, since my glory days haven't been accomplished, capable folks.  But, there's a difference between really, really, good riders (or coaches) and the people who are actively pushing the max in the discipline of their choosing.

Part of what I love about my current barn is that no one is trying to push the limits.  No one's training 8 hours a day, no one is working 18 different jobs to pay for an international campaign, or so obsessed they can't sit back and enjoy down time at the barn.  That is to say, while I respect upper level riders in any sport, I also really, really enjoy that our barn is everyone's escape.  It's everyone's hobby - and no one's job. 

Occasionally I miss the buzz of an active show season, I love watching horses progress from event to event, and I love cheering on barn mates.  But, the flip side offers benefits too.  No one is stressing out, no panicked searches for that suddenly MIA running martingale attachment, Saturday mornings are more often spent riding out on the roads and trails than shoving an increasingly less organized mass of trunks and boxes into trailers to haul out.  (somehow I always started the season with a place for everything and everything in it's place.. then after four or five shows, I'd end up digging through bins of loose tack that more closely resemble tangled Christmas tree lights than careful packed equipment).

However, I recently felt that little spark of curiosity that comes when talking to a barn mate about their latest dressage test or xc run.  That compulsive feeling that you could not possibly do one more thing without hearing all the details. 

The closest non-horsey equivalent I can think of is when a roommate would come home from a first date. 

"Tell me everything."  was usually the first thing out of my mouth.  Same reaction with a barn mate.  I want to know everything.  Every gallop, every approach, the flower box under every stadium fence, each transition in your dressage ride... everything.

Anyway, the resurgence of the "spark" came when chatting the other day with our newest boarder.  H is potentially the nicest (least crazy) horse person I've ever met.  She rolled in from Colorado a couple months ago where apparently she ran her own training outfit, though I've heard remarkably few details on it.  She brought an adorable Connemara/TB cross whose shaggy coat and diminutive stature belie her true athleticism.  When H is gone (presumably on business), her delightfully charming (and geeky, and British) husband attempts to groom and hand graze her pony (CUTER) while he politely asks for tips on how-in-the-hell-do-you-make-them-pick-up-their-feet. 

H is also meticulously groomed.  Meticulous in that "oh gosh I just throw this on" sort of way, not in the over dyed, over preened, over-jeweled DQ sort of way.  She's always in some sort of adorable stripped button down shirt, with an adorably contrasting bright v-neck sweater... perhaps with a small kerchief should the temperatures warrant it.  (essentially, if there were a j.crew catalog for riders... she'd be wearing it).

So about a week ago, we were chatting about former horses and former horsie lives.  H casually mentioned that one of her old horses is sponsored by smartpak now.  While this is obviously cool (and financially excellent), I assumed that maybe this was because she blogged about smartpak, or wrote lots of reviews, or her horse had some insane recovery using their products or something.

OR 

It's because her horse is currently on the USEF team, currently entered in Rolex and maybe one of my favorite US eventers currently gunning for London 2012.

He's not the most winning, or the fanciest, but Destination Known is DARN cute and my jaw about hit the floor when I learned she was the one who rescued him from a kill auction and rode him up the ranks. 

So that's when the spark hit.  Tell me EVERYTHING.  Tell me about your eventing, tell me about Destination Known, tell me about going advanced, tell me about your fall, tell me about why you stopped, tell me about your pony, tell me about EVERYTHING.

It was great to hear her story, and great to see her enjoying just having a little pony to bounce around with.

What a bad ass... I love my barn.

April Goals (& an attempt at Confirmation Pics...)

Holy crap its April.  In business land I'm crapping my pants because it's already Q2 and in theory my sales curve should be shooting up like a hockey stick.  Of course, the PNW continues to dredge itself in the cloudy damp blanket of winter, which sorta slows down the demand for high end irrigation systems (fortunately our drainage sales are doing JUST fine)..

April.  Last April I thought I'd be doing some schooling shows.  Total shows to date? wellll.... zero.  But that's ok.  Things went a slightly different direction than we anticipated for a bit, so no ribbons for Miss P yet (though I don't think she minds).

This April, the goals are limited and concise:

1) Figure out hormones.

2) Figure out feet.

I'd like to be headed into May with a clear understanding of how we're proceeding with hormone options (more Regu-Mate, stay natural, rip out ovaries..) even if surgery or more meds aren't immediately happening.

I'd also like to know what the crap is going on with P's feet.  There's a vet at the barn today for another pony, so he's putting some hoof testers on the mare to see if there's any response, but I'm having my vet come out next week for a general physical anyway

Why pay a farm call when she's not "off" and nothing seems to be objectively deteriorating?

Well, The Boy mentioned that we haven't hauled to the vet in a while and he's bored (just kidding).  But in reality, I haven't really had a vet bill in a while (apparently I've repressed the memories of ultrasounding P all September), so I'm feeling like there's money to burn.

In all seriousness though, It's been 11 months since the initial Wobbler diagnosis and I'd like to do a retest of P's nuero exercises, along with a check-in after 3 months on Regu-Mate.  Mr. Vet Man hasn't seen P since she smacked her tendon - and I figure before we start x-raying our toes, we might as well get a workup and see if anything else is jumping out at him for possible explanations.

I mean, why not.  It's only money

In another twist of fate, when I sent in an email giving a quick synopsis of P's behavior with the Regu-Mate, other considerations (new shoes, bodywork.. etc.) and my current thoughts - my vet wrote me back right away.  No nasty front desk lady, no runaround, just a quick prompt reply.   So maybe I should make that a goal too, just so that I can check it off

Goal #3) better communication with Vet office - CHECK!

Anyway, I went to see the beast yesterday just to pat her on the nose and she how she's enjoying her week off and first cycle of the new year.  P was in full lover-mare mode and was as quiet and sweet as she ever is.  She stood sleepily in the crossties while I curried a weekend's worth of mud and gunk off of her, yawning and licking the whole time.  She's remarkably less girthy than she has been, I'm thinking that might have something to do with the slow feeder? who knows.  She's obsessed with that thing...

I ambled the mare out to the ring to chase her around a bit, but she didn't seem to have a ton of energy to burn off.  She free lunged perfectly.  Stayed on a 20x40 oval around me, cantering for about 10 minutes before she listened to my request for a change in direction (I wave whip, she changes direction..). Her trot looked pretty good.  Not as mincy as last week, but still not as big as it was before her trim.  She's looking consistently more balanced and uphill to the right which is new.. maybe all of our work on that side is starting to pay off.

There's something about a good free lunge that leaves me feeling so completely satisfied and connected with that mare.  She's so responsive, it's ridiculous.  Perfect transitions (you only ask once), she adjusts her stride within a gait on command, and she didn't miss a single change of direction (which I really started playing with since she was being so good).  We halted, we cantered, we walked, we lengthened, we halted... what fun.

She does get a little annoyed at having to keep walking when she's tired - Instead she just stops, looks at you, then comes in for a scratch.  I sent her back out to walk on a circle a few times before relenting and agreeing to walk with her while she cooled out.  Since she was so chill, I thought it would be a good opportunity to attempt some confirmation pics, but the mare was trying to be good and stick to my shoulder, which made posing her a little difficult.  Here's the attempts:

Not a bad start.. but not a perfect angle..

She got tired of standing by herself apparently..

Try again mare...

Still bored....

please look at me?

Or the ground...

yeah ok, we're done.

Anyway, probably didn't help my case that I had been encouraging her to stay pinned to my shoulder while we were walking, but who cares.

Oh, and in my boredom I attempted to document P's halterless leading with the iphone.  Fair warning - this is blurry and might give you motion sickness, but if you can identify us in the mirrors, you'll see that the mare is actually fairly decent at this.

I think I confused her with trying to hold my phone up... she didn't like the adjustment in my body language, but she figured it out.  Mostly...

Holy Creep Factor

(Warning - total tangent post...)
 
I'm not sure if it's the lingering sense of P's toes hurting her, or the fact that I spent way too much time in the sun and way too much time traipsing around in ridiculous heels this past weekend, but I have been having totally bizarre horsey dreams.

The first totally-creepy dream has happened a couple of times in the last month and involves the last two horses I had at my old home/property that I grew up in.  Basically I spend the whole dream panicked because I forgot to let Star (the gazillion year old pony) and Dollar (my old trusty pony club mount) out of of their stalls and into their pastures for the day.

Of course, over the course of the dream, the situation warped from leaving them in their stalls (where presumably they would have been munching on their breakfast and had plenty of water..) to somehow leaving them in my car (weird), with the windows rolled up (even weirder).

Both times I've had this dream I manage to make it back to my car, which is of course parked in front of my barn (why the horses were in the car and not the barn is beyond my understanding of my own brain) just in time to watch Dollar poop in the back seat.  Mind you, while maybe (if absolutely necessary) I could have shoved Star into a car... I'm pretty sure there was no way that Dollar's gangley mass of limbs could have ever been folded into my back seat...let alone both of them at the same time.

The other dream was creepier and starred Pia, who  for some reason I had dropped off at a fairground (maybe we were showing?) and put her in a portable stall.  I then promptly left her (maybe I have abandonment issues??) without hanging water buckets, putting down bedding or giving her hay.  In spite of the fact that I wasn't initially concerned with my lack of care for P in her new stall, as soon as I left the fairground I went into a full on panic- and spent the rest of the dream trying to get back to P in order to water/feed/bed her but unfortunately I ran into a Zombie mob who was eating people and generally making the return trip to the fairgrounds totally inconvenient. 

When I finally got back to P, she wasn't in a stall (but in something more like a storage unit) and she had magically turned into a goat, which distressed me greatly.  Not because she was a goat - But because I was trying to tack up for a dressage test (no idea where the zombies went) and her bridle no longer fit.

Moral of the story?

1) Three nights in Vegas is at least one too many.
and
2) Apparently I'm secretly terrified of abandoning my horses in totally inappropriate situations.

I'd very much like to return to the horsey dreams of my childhood which resembled some sort of amalgamation of National Velvet and The Black Stallion...  They were significantly less stressful

What the cuss.

My curiosity got the best of me so I looked up Abandonment (others) in the Dream Dictionary and it said this :

To abandon others in your dream, suggests that you are overwhelmed by the problems and decisions in your life. 

 Under "Horse" it had this (I deleted the non-relevant situations):

To see a horse in your dream, symbolizes strength, power, endurance, virility and sexual prowess. It also represents a strong, physical energy.  You need to tame the wild forces within. The dream may also be a pun that you are "horsing around". Alternatively, to see a horse in your dream, indicate that you need to be less arrogant and "get off your high horse".

To see a black or dark horse in your dream, signifies mystery, wildness, and the unknown. You are taking a chance or a gamble at some unknown situation. It may even refer to occult forces.

Finally, Zombies apparently mean this:

To dream that you are attacked by zombies, indicate that you are feeling overwhelmed by forces beyond your control. You are under tremendous stress in your waking life. Alternatively, the dream represents your fears of being helpless and overpowered.

Okaaaay... so I'm overwhelmed, arrogant, strong, messing with the occult and helpless?

Or maybe I'm just nervous that P's toes hurt and I haven't seen her in a few days.

Sticky-icky-icky

Two rides to report on - Wednesday and Thursday.

P had a few days off on Wednesday, so I was expecting her to be somewhat off the walls (which she was), though I was pleased that her outbursts were contained and totally manageable.

Instead of bucking, she just sorta hippity-hopped a few times in the canter

Instead of taking off while "bucking" she responded immediately and positively to a strong half halt and firm "bad mare."

Instead of being a total nit-wit with her stickiness, she kept moving (albeit barely), and worked through it.

It wasn't our best ride by any means, but it was a productive one given the excess of energy we were dealing with.  I was disappointed that the stickiness seems to have resurfaced or at least increased significantly - But the fact that it is showing up when she's hyper and feeling naughty, along with the fact that it's always near the gate have me thinking that I've been too lenient with my corrections.  O

nce we were through the sticky portion of the ride, she was decent.  I didn't get total relaxation, but I did manage to get P firmly in my outside rein, and she was more responsive to changes in bend than she usually is, which was fun to play with.

She was trying to freak out at everything in the ring (branches, mirrors, shadows...) so that was obnoxious, but I got after her each time and she seemed to accept it and move on.

The really fun part of the day was when I let her free lunge a bit before tacking up.  Maybe it was the extra day off, but holy LORD she looked like a million bucks.  I've never seen her move that well, or with that much freedom in her shoulder.

Her trot was stellar, her canter was really uphill and light... it was all very, very pretty.  Maybe we're on a good path physically? I certainly hope so..

Thursday.  Thursday the farrier came again.  I was lucky enough to catch him still at the barn so we talked about P's feet.  He's still not happy with her hinds or her heels - but things are progressing.  The right hind is starting to even out, though it still has a bit of flare on the inside edge which I'm anxious to grow past.

The good news, is that P didn't try to snack on the farrier when he put her away today.  The bad news is I was terrified she would come out with her little baby-mincing steps again.  We tacked up (she was bratty), and got ready to go. I think she was all out of sorts because getting her toes done meant she couldn't play with her slow feeder non-stop like she has been, but who knows ;)

I threw her on the lunge and yup.  Mincing.  This is the second time she's been short post-trim.  I can't tell if I'm imagining it, or if it's real, but I don't like it.  I know the farrier is really highly respected, and P's feet weren't abnormally warm.. so I can't think of a good reason for her to be backed off on the lunge.  She worked right out of it (like usual) after some cantering, so I kept going.

I hopped on and decided that if she felt short under saddle, we'd just walk for a while and stretch her legs for 45 minutes.  When I asked for the trot, she moved right into it, but then stopped.  The Sticky was back, and even bigger than before.  Chest bite, hopping on her front legs and pinned ears.

Not what we've been dealing with.

So, two thoughts.  Either A) her feet hurt and they made her stickier. or B) the sticky has been on a progression for the last week and this was just the next step.

Regardless, I didn't want to let her get away with it entirely... so we worked through it with more difficultly than there has been and got about 15 minutes of decent work in.  Little bit of canter, little bit of trot, some stretcy trot and a few lenghtenings then DONE.

Now the mare has the weekend off while I zip away for a bachelorette party for a friend.  Her regumate should be running out today or tomorrow... so curious what will be there when I show up next week :)