Caprivi

Caprivi 

2009-2019

If you are a horse person (I’m guessing that if you’re reading this blog, the likelihood of the answer being ‘yes’ is particularly high), and you have been doing this for any period of time (let’s say longer than oh 5 days), then you have faced with a time when you question why. Why do you continue to push through the blood, sweat, and tears? Why do you pour your time, energy, commitment, and dollars (SO MANY DOLLARS) in to the love of the 4 legged? Why do you sacrifice so much for another day in the saddle? For me, at least, the answer is a moment in time with a horse like Caprivi.

On June 2, 2018, I posted an ISO ad on Facebook. Looking for yet another young horse to bring along. Something in the 4-6-year-old range, with a lot of talent, but not a lot of knowledge or training. Baby horses are really where my sweet spot lies in my riding ability, and what I enjoy the most. I received a lot (I mean 120+) responses, with many nice (and many uh, not so nice) horses, but there was a particular private message that intrigued me. A barn manager messaged me and said, “I have a horse at my place that really meets none of your criteria, however I think he’s a pretty nice guy, let me know if you want some video.” My interest was piqued. Nothing like telling me a horse is not what I’m looking for, not having any video, and then taking an entire week to send any footage to cement my interest.

The horse was a 9-year-old Trakehner gelding. Clearly attractive, clearly had talent, but was in need of body conditioning, some good time under saddle, and some love.

A fancy warmblood or a grade quarter horse? Not sure.

As happenstance would have it, he lived in Virginia Beach, and I was making a work trip just a few days later to D.C., so I made plans to make the quick jaunt over to the barn to see him in person. My quick jaunt became laughable as a 2.5 hour drive quickly turned to 5, and then closer to 6. Virginia traffic, you are no joke.

When I rode Caprivi for the first time, it felt a little like riding a train that had come off the tracks but was desperately trying to find its way back on. It felt to me like he had been given a lot of mixed signals, been through some rough riding, and he was incredibly defensive to ride. That said, there was something in there, something that whispered I should give him a chance, something that said he deserved the time and energy I had to give, something that told me he was to be mine.

I only had the pleasure of owning Caprivi for a few short months. Our story began at the summer shows in Colorado where I spent long hours with him trying to learn what he needed and stuffing his face with peppermints.

I likey the mints little boy, hand them over.

We had a moderately successful time at the show, but honestly our real story began when I got him back to Texas.

His entire way of going under saddle needed to be broken down and built back up from the ground up. His canter was unbalanced, his lead change was quirky, his grudges were deep. But underneath it all, was a current of trust we built together. He required a 50/50 partnership all the way. If you didn’t meet him halfway, it wasn’t happening. Actually, there were times if you didn’t meet him ALL the way, he just wouldn’t either. But the glimmers of greatness were there from the beginning.

The change in him was transformative

Caprivi was a conundrum in so many ways. He had a huge stride where he could barely fit the step in on one line, but then add two in the next. He had the easiest and smoothest lead change in the world, but only when he didn’t think about it too hard. He was the loveliest horse to hack, but had 100 tricks up his sleeve to the jumps. He was beautiful; he was tricky; he was demanding, and he is one of my favorites I’ve ever owned.

Our first, and what was to be only time showing 3'

On Monday, April 15^th I headed to the barn on a beautiful spring day. We had had what was our best jumping school ever on the previous Saturday, ending with a short course of 3 flawless jumps and a perfect lead change. We were prepping for summer showing, and I was confident we would qualify for Zone championships, my goal for 2019. Mondays were hack days for C, and on this day I rode in the grass field focused on balance, transitions, and the dreaded counter canter. Our last ride together was frankly, one of our best. Caprivi hated the counter canter, but on this day, I can say he (finally, finally) figured it out. We ended with a lovely left-lead counter canter around the big oak, followed by a short trail ride down to the creek.

As I was changing clothes in the bathroom, two of the guys that work at the barn, came pounding on the door, telling me there was a problem with one of my horses and I needed to come now, right now.  I threw my clothes on and ran to his stall. About 100 things were running through my head as what could possibly be the problem. I literally had fed him a treat and walked away from his stall no more than 5 minutes previously.

Horses, being horses, can find unique ways to get themselves in to all kinds of danger, but this did not look good. When rolling, he had managed to get a leg caught, and hang himself upside down in his stall. Things quickly went from bad to worse as he managed to pull a grate of bars off the wall with his leg trapped between. What transpired over the next 20 minutes is nothing I wish on anyone. But I can say affirmatively that as the entire crew at the barn worked to save him, I was glad I was there with them, and no one else.

Caprivi had done significant damage to both of his back legs, the left one taking the brunt of the blows from the bars. He was bleeding badly, non-weight bearing, and in a lot of pain. I knew immediately that he had to go in, and I knew that if there was one place that could save his leg, it would be Texas Equine Hospital. As I made the 2-hour drive to Bryan, all I could think was the pain he was in, how scared he was to get in the trailer, and how we went from a beautiful morning hack to a life-threatening injury in a matter of seconds.

Upon arrival, his prognosis was guarded. Based on initial assessment, he had severed 25% of his Achilles tendon, and Dr. Honnas warned me that an injury like this could go one way or the other. As they worked on his leg, his entire body shook, and shook, and shook. The amount of shock and pain that he was in cannot be understated. About 3 hours in to his treatment, as I was rubbing his head above his eyes just like he likes he finally looked at me and took a deep breath. He put his head in my arms and closed his eyes. I like to think he knew we were trying to help, and we would do all we could to save him.

Over the next 5 days, Caprivi did everything right. He was a perfect patient and was improving every 12 hours just as he needed to. On Friday morning I got texts from both of his vets that they were thrilled with his progress, and that he was doing excellent. By Friday afternoon, it was unfortunately a different story. He had suddenly lost stability in the leg and was quickly losing normal function of the gait. They wanted to give him 24 hours to see what would happen, but the early good prognosis had vanished.

As I headed to the clinic on Saturday, it was with a lot of trepidation. I didn’t want to lose my horse, but I didn’t want him to suffer needlessly either. It’s impossible to know what the right decision is in these kinds of situations, and I hoped that Caprivi was that slim chance of a miracle. Unfortunately, when I arrived no miracle had occurred. His leg had degraded since the previous day, and in the end, there was really no choice to be made. I spent the afternoon sitting quietly with him, stuffing his face with carrots, peppermints, and as much time grazing as he could handle. Twice he quietly let me know he needed to head back to his stall for a rest. It wasn’t easy for him to maneuver, but I think he enjoyed the time in the sunshine.

A red halter never looked so good

For those of you medically inclined, the necropsy showed that Caprivi suffered from a complete rupture of the medial tendon of the gastrocnemius and about 50% rupture of the superficial flexor tendon. It is of course impossible to say what happened between Friday morning and Friday afternoon, but the best theory is that he had a partial tear of the gastrocnemius that was not detected with the original injury given where it was torn. As he began to place more weight on the leg, what was left of that tendon gave way, leading to the significant instability and sinking of his hock.

Some would say I’ve had a run of bad luck with horses, but I disagree. I would say horses are a part of my life, my soul, and my being. And they are quite simply tragedies waiting to happen. Although our time together was not long, I became Caprivi’s person. He needed someone to trust, someone to believe in him, and someone to give him confidence. In the end, I hope I did that for him, and I hope he knows how hard we tried to save his life. To say I will miss him is an understatement of no measure, but I will. I will miss the partnership, the trust, and finding the keys to unlock the puzzle of his potential. I will miss his kind nature, thoughtful patience, and willingness. I will miss my friend.

There are a few people that have helped me through this terrible week, that deserve much thanks. Miguel, Lallo, and Enorio, for their incredible horsemanship and working together as a team to get him out of the emergent situation. Kalli, for her ability to help me think through situations infinitum, kindness, and long support. Stephen, for his steadfast support, which I have to say, I manage to push to every limit possible. All of my dear friends that have kept my phone lit up with checking in, you guys are amazing. Dr. Honnas for his ever-enduring patience, knowledge, and expertise. And a special special thanks to Dr. Alvaraz who answered every text, every question, sent me photos, videos, fed him treats, took him on walks, and in the end was there with him to say goodbye when I couldn’t be.

Godspeed Caprivi.

Finding Me

It might be easiest to pick up this blog where I left off (forever and a day ago) with Derbies!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3elK698Wlc

And Pretty Ribbons!

OK that's a poop brown ribbon but it's pretty to me in a national derby out of 40+ horses!

And a classic where I was 13^th out of a zillion and missed the cut by half a point because I am an idiot and forgot to ask for a lead change not that I’m still bitter or anything.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEXrSq4NgxM

However, I have been encouraged by a few to write my story of finding me, so I will. Besides, it would be reticent of me to just ignore this part, and pretend like it never happened

DH and I worked very hard to get pregnant. There were a series of heartbreaks, trials, issues, surgeries and other fun things. So I will start this blog by stating I understand how lucky I am. I understand that the LO (Little One) is a blessing beyond belief, and that I should be grateful for every minute I was pregnant, and every minute I have with my son.

That said, I can say with all of my heart I have not struggled as much as I did when I (finally) got pregnant, and honestly still continue to find hard at times.

I have defined myself as a “horse girl” for as long as I can remember. You know the kind (if you’re a reader of this blog and don’t know the kind, clearly you’ve lost your way). The barn rat who lives and breathes horses. Growing up I spent all free time, summers, vacations, mornings, afternoons, and nights with horses. Since then I have found a way to keep horses in my life at all costs. In college I worked three jobs, Nanny, Shot Girl, and Technology analyst at the same time (true story). When entering the work world, I would skip out on team lunches to get to the barn early, used my vacation time to go to shows, and have since done anything and everything to make it work.

Then I got pregnant, and felt my world crashing in on me. Even through all of my other roles in life, I was defined as a horse girl first (just ask my coworkers how boring I am speaking nothing of horses horses horses all the time, good thing my friends understand). Now suddenly it became clear to me that I would be mommy first. Call it a 1/3 life crisis, call it an unexpected side effect, but my panic about my self-identity was all encompassing. I felt both terrified and sad, then guilty in a cyclical succession. How could I possibly change me?

My path through was thankfully filled with support from my unbelievable DH, some amazing friends, and in the end the world’s cutest baby (if I do say so myself). I hacked TJ up until 33 weeks, and still got on at week 37 to walk around. I was so swollen I could barely get my paddock boots on, much less zipped, and my half chaps were more like sausage casings (I was fun a parties, that much is for sure). But, I was on, and was that all that mattered.

From the other side of pregnancy, having a beautiful, healthy baby boy, I’d love to say that it’s all rainbows and sunshine. But there are days (all of them…) that all I really want to do is go to the barn and all I really can do is fold more onsies. I might be mom first but the horse girl isn’t far behind. 

Oh, and it doesn’t hurt that I juuuuust might have bought a little something to keep me entertained for a few years. Meet Wesson

Maybe, just maybe I will set aside time to blog more often, and be more connected to this world instead of baby world. Here’s to hoping.       

The Working (Pregnant) Rider + WEF Day 2 - Really, officially Day 1, in my head.

“Previously on The Working Rider” –  Goals were made, dreams were broken, confidence shattered, and the Working Rider was completely ill prepared for what became the most trying horse show experience of her life. Stay tuned for more!

It was suggested on the Chronicle of the Horse Bulletin Boards that my blog is like following a soap opera. Although I’m not sure how to digest this allegory, I can’t deny what might be an accurate description.

So first, for the big announcement of the day, yes I am pregnant! I found out in mid-January. Being the reasonable person I am, the only logical thing I could think to do was to add two weeks of showing in Gulfport onto the already planned four in Wellington. I mean, why not? If everything worked out it would be my last showing (horses) of the season and what could possibly go wrong with this plan? Not even one thing. Hahahahahahhahhaaha

Really, considering it was my first trimester, I wasn’t affected that much. But between 12-16 hour work days (work was crazy crazy), 6 am hacks, stressful showing, and often hanging up on my last conference call after midnight, I flat out did not have any energy to do anything. Including write this blog. I took notes, dreamed of the days when my fingers would fly across the keyboard chronicling my days, and hoped that I would return to writing when things settled down a bit.  

That day is today, and thus I continue with….

Day 2

I think we can all agree that Day 1 should really just be forgotten about. I retired from the eq ring eons ago, and maybe I should have just stuck to my hand dropping, shoulder hunching guns. DC was just showing me the light that I didn’t want to equitate anyway and Medals are for those just graduating into the younger adult section, not those about to graduate from it. By the way, freaked out about my last younger year? Nooooo not me!

I began Day 2 with much excitement of getting back into the show ring with my ever trusty TJ. If there ever was a confidence builder, he is it. Having owned him for exactly 7 years now, we’ve built a relationship of just knowing that the other side will be there for better (International Derbies! Championships! 3’6 hunters) and for worse (Crashes! Lameness! Choke!). TJ is currently leased to a lovely adult rider who lets me borrow him on occasion for my own enjoyment and some assurance that I am more than just a monkey with two feet in the stirrups.

The plan was to hack DC in the morning, while Kelley (a lovely young pro) did TJ, and then I would lightly jump TJ to start my confidence back up after the previous day. In even better news, my division was scheduled for the aforementioned Rost arena where I had had great experiences the previous year, AND felt very ready for. I thought about having confidence, but then realized that was a terrible idea.

DC hacked great for me, light in the bridle, forward off my leg, and in a generally pleasant mood (as we know mood means a lot for DC). I hopped on TJ and honestly had some dead good riding going on. I was straight, had good rhythm, and was really finding the jumps nicely. Matt, being incredibly impressed that I could actually ride a horse and not just pretend like I used to know how, sent me away after only a few jumps to save him for later. 

I’d love to say I spent the morning wandering the show grounds, doing some shopping, finding the best food, and having a generally good time. But, in light of my work demands, all of my days were spent looking something like this:

The working rider: Laptop, MiFi, and lunch in my cooler. I really know how to glam it up in WEF.

In the official order of go, I was 8^th on DC and 17^th on TJ. A little pleading and I was allowed to switch their places. I REALLY needed my TJ crutch to get me in the ring with a bit less “kick, pull, lean, miss” and a bit more “hand and leg together, rhythm, collection, straightness.” Riding is so easy; the horse does all of the work after all.

I wandered by TJ’s stall, and he definitely seemed ready to conquer the world.

If TJ were to pick a hobby, sleep would be #1 on the list.

Warming up on TJ, I felt exactly as I needed to feel. I saw the jumps well, knew he would take care of any BS I were to throw his way in the ring, and ready. Since it was a Saturday, I as lucky enough to have a cheering squad/videographer in the sometimes roommate. 

Looking back watching the video, you can almost see my nerves being expressed through his canter as I jittered my way around the course.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=noHxbgo0k9M

We were close, we were long, we had a hard rub, but we also survived, and were less than embarrassing.

For the Handy, I took a deep breath and actually did less jittering and more riding

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VReaVu4Wo6w

I missed my inside turn after the trot jump, but my transition was beautiful, and it really was quite decent.

To be completely honest, TJ is not the winner at that level of competition, but he IS worth his weight in gold as he hauls my butt around the 3’3 A/Os and on the same weekend successfully navigates a Low Adult division. Not to mention the confidence he gave me getting on my gray beast.

Who basically was amazing. Given the fact that the previous day was a true torture session in the ring, I halfway expected the opinionated DC to come out with the opinion that horse showing wasn’t for him. Thankfully, though opinionated he’s also forgiving, and truly stepped it up in a BIG way.

We walked into the ring with a good calm, a confident stride and laid down a very nice course:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZSvL1J5KV0

In the handy we were a bit sticky in the rollback, and our trot was a bit rough in the transition, but overall it was good as well. I even remembered my inside turn!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5tdPn-frbI

The line -> trot jump sequence was a tough one for many riders. I’ll tell you that although mine was not the best, it certainly wasn’t the worst, and I actually trotted!

In the end I jogged second and second on DC

Aren’t they pretty!?

And even jogged 10^th on TJ in the handy!

Considering we are going to pretend Day 1 didn’t exist, the "real" Day 1 could not have gone better. Two pretty red ribbons and a black horse that is the kindest animal in the world. 

What more could I want??

WEF Day 1 (2015)

A quick synopses of the day after our arrival in Wellington:

1. Go to barn, check on horses
2. TJ isn’t eating, generally seems unwell, and is dehydrated. Panic panic panic, make a million phone calls, panic panic some more, rush around to find the meds that I (accidentally left at home), panic panic.
3. DC is pacing and pawing. Panic panic, he’s not going to settle, panic panic
4. Realize I’m about to miss my plane, panic panic, oh God, my flight leaves in a half hour panic panic

Right, so that went well….

On to day 1!

Honestly? I’d prefer if I didn’t have to call this day one given how well day 2 went (foreshadowing), but nevertheless….

You can imagine my excitement as I arrived to the show grounds bright and early, with such confidence as I

• Knew my way around and
• Had nothing but glowing reports about DC all week

We were starting in the unassuming Rost arena, where we had had much success in the previous year.

With this confidence, I walked to my stalls only to get a (ping!) text from Matt. “You’ve been moved to Grand, make sure you hack there.”

I can promise you, at this moment a few choice words were muttered by yours truly. Grand was where the epic melt down happened in the previous year. And although horses might not have memories like Elephants, I do.

With trepidation, I walked to the Grand to do my morning hack, and joined about 5,000 of my closest friends

Immediately I was reminded that although a “fancy” horse, DC has NOTHING on the quality you see of the average competitor at WEF. Cresty necked beauties that were 10 movers (if you think you’ve seen a 10 mover, think again) sauntered merrily around the ring looking all perfect.

Meanwhile me and a DC tried to manage a reasonable hack without

• Biting anyone around us
• Squealing with joy at the sight of the pretty bay horses (him, not me)
•   Making a general fool of ourselves.

I had obtained success and was feeling generally good about my hack. I should learn to be less confident.

As we walked around sniffing the jumps and thinking about how amazing we were going to be later in the day, we walked up to a particular jump that had a nice astroturf ground line. Great, fine, all good, and then as I turned him to walk to the next jump, he thought maybe the ground line was actually meant to be stepped on. Except it wasn’t. His knee buckled he fell over himself taking a walking step, and we ended up on our knees blinking stupidly as he couldn’t quite figure out how he went from standing perfectly nicely to on his knees on the ground.

Please note that my #1 goal for this year was to not make a fool of myself at WEF.

This is why I do not make goals.

For our plan for the first show day was to do the Ariat adult  medal as a nice warm up for the A/O. Fantastic plan. Until it wasn’t. Honestly, I’ve not had a worse moment of absentee-riding in my entire life. I walked into the ring and froze. Call it PTSD, call it nerves, call it the horrific. Whatever it is, it was bad. I will save you the recount of the horribleness fence by fence, but know that we had one stop, one run chip, one pull pull pull and nothing, and a horse that was grinding his teeth in anger by the time I walked out of the ring.

Please note that my #1 goal for this year was to not make a fool of myself at WEF.

This is why I do not make goals.

I came away feeling like I should either quit riding, drive myself and my horses back to Texas with my tail between my legs, or at very least, drop down a division. Matt loves when my confidence plummets. It’s his favorite part of having me as a customer, I promise.

A series of pep talks and a little ride on my favorite TJ, and we decided to stick with the plan of the 3’3 A/Os on both horses. For that, I am thankful, as we will all find out about in DAY 2!!!!!

Countdown to WEF!

In trying to prepare for Epic Winter Tour (EWT) 2015, I decided I needed a strict program, lots of lessons, and a strong exercise program so we could be as ready as possible. This pretty much worked just about as well as weather, horses, and work would allow it.

Stage 1 – A week at Woodhill

After ending on a sub-par note at the Thanksgiving and Christmas shows in December in Texas, Matt and I agreed that spending a week at Woodhill in January couldn’t be the worst thing in the world for either of us. The plan was to take the horses on Friday, lesson over the weekend, and leave them there until the next weekend for Matt to ride and then more lessons before heading home. Unfortunately due to my work schedule, I absolutely had to be in Austin Friday afternoon and Sunday morning (remember Woodhill is 3.5 hours away north of Ft. Worth in Northlake). As a result I coerced DH into going on a one day turn around trip up to the Farm, ride 5 horses, and back to Austin. Leaving at 5 am, some excellent lessons, a truck stuck in the mud, and a shutdown highway later, and we were back in Austin just shy of 2 am. Seriously, my husband is the best.

Over the next week I got excellent reports on DC with texts such as “considering the weather, he wasn’t bad” and “well he’s straighter now, I hope.” Raving reports I tell you.

The second weekend I was actually able to do consecutive days of riding and got to school both TJ and DC in the big field. We prepared for WEF by jumping this:

And this:

And this:

AND THIS!

Just kidding, that we tried to walk by, spooked 5 feet and I almost came off. How great of a story would that have been? “How’d you come off?” “Oh I was walking by the water jump.” “Jumping the water jump?” “No, just walking.”

Both horses were great all weekend, and I felt like I had some good homework for the next two weeks.

Stage 2a – Two weeks at home with lots of work

Stage 2b – Pray it stops raining

Stage 2c – Realize it’s not going to stop raining and pick my way through some grass like areas trying to just keep the horses in shape.

Stage 2d – 30 degrees and freezing rain -- Just give up and start dreaming of Florida and 85 degrees. Who needs prep anyways?

Stage 3 – DRIVE TO WELLINGTON

Fantastically, the drive to Wellington was mostly uneventful. No polar vortex related traffic, no colicky horses, just the awesome BFFs DC and TJ hanging in the trailer being their angelic selves.

However, I can tell you that if you need a friend at an Ag station, Howard at the Escambia County office is the man to know. Howard and I became close as the coggins I printed wasn’t signed, my Health Certs didn’t match the other paperwork, and the State Veterinarian wanted to quarantine me for 24 hours. I placed a panicked phone call to my vet, had new paperwork emailed to me, and then sent to my new BFF Howard. Bless his heart, he printed it for me, sent an online copy to the State Vet, and got me out of the quarantine restrictions. Thank God for small favors by Howard who clearly went above and beyond to help get me to my destination.

Stage 4 – Arrive!!!!

We arrived to the PBEC at a decent time of 5pm, which seemed decent until I realized the daunting task of everything that needed to be done to settle the horses. We are stabled this year on the show grounds instead of one of the farmettes offsite. Our long term stalls were full, so we had some layover stalls on grounds. After finally heading to my winter home (I’m the sometimes roommate) at 11pm, I crashed with dreams of those blue ribbons that I was sure to win, or something.

Chronicle of the Horse, they actually published me!

Honestly, until I got my first comment on facebook, I thought perhaps COTH was going to call me up and say "just kidding, we're going to profile someone who matters, let's say someone with a name like Margie or Beezie."

The chances were high really.

But, as it turns out they really were serious about publishing my article

http://www.chronofhorse.com/magazine

AND adding me to their blog roll

http://www.chronofhorse.com/article/wit-sass-and-cute-horse-pictures-introducing-blogger-anna-corley

Ok that's pretty much all I've got.

But really. What else can be said?

News! News! News!

As alluded to in my last blog of 2014, there are some new and exciting things happening in the world of mis caballos and my little blog in 2015.

1. New barn! In a fortunate turn of events, two stalls opened up at a barn that is four, count them FOUR minutes from my house. Sometimes when traffic isn’t bad I can make it in three and a half. Please try to hold back your jealousy of my new commute. Granted, I am paying a premium for the location, but given the time I am getting back during my day, and that it’s directly on the way home, well worth it. Both horses seemed to settle right in to their new digs, and this is DC’s new view.

The first day there I might have gone out three times just to check on them. Obsessive?  Maybe, but it’s FOUR MINUTES AWAY. Try not to be green with envy.

2. Chronicle of the Horse (part a)! In November, COTH reached out to me regarding writing an article about WEF from a working amateur perspective. After much consternation over each word written, I turned in my article at the end of December. I really think they It’s due to be included in the January 19^th printed issue, and will also be online. They’re even including pictures of me and DC competing. He’ll be like, famous and stuff. Just don’t tell him, he already thinks he’s hot enough stuff.

3. Chronicle of the Horse (part b)! In addition to the article, COTH has asked me to be featured as a regular blogger for their “voices” section of the website. It’s an incredible honor that they asked me to participate. I believe that anything I write will be posted both here and there, but let’s just guess what will get more reads??! Ha.

4. WEF 2015! Hold your breath, knock on wood, cross your fingers, and any other superstition you can add in for no soundness, colic, suicidal horse issues, and we are headed back to WEF for four weeks in 2015. Not only that, but DC will have some company in the form of a big black horse named TJ. The Adventures of Yin and Yang will be the title of my best-selling book, sounds like a winner right?

5. Time Warps! I’ve decided the best way to finish out my 2014 show year is via time warps. If one shows up, know that it is likely something that I did ages ago. Perhaps the 6 month perspective on THE WORST TRIP HOME FROM COLORADO EVER KNOWN TO MAN will be beneficial. No, actually maybe not.

So, 2015, heeeere we go!

Final Blog 2014

First, let me address the blog followers who have taken the time to reach out to me and ask if/when I will start blogging again. I am so flattered that there are people that have enjoyed reading this little blog as much as I have enjoyed writing it. I appreciate your encouraging words, and hope that you continue to read as I move forward with more writing in 2015!

Second, I really never wrapped up blogging of my showing in 2014. Derbies! Classics! And Crashes Oh My! I am indecisive as to if it is worth revisiting my experiences at this point or not. Perhaps I should just for my own memories, we will see how it goes. If anyone has an opinion, let me know!

Third, what the heck happened to me??? Honestly, life just got on a run-away train and blogging went by the wayside. Sadly it’s just what happened.

And last, there are some exciting things that are planned to happen in 2015. A hoped for return trip to Wellington, and maybe some exciting moves for my writing and blog!

For those of you still reading, thanks for sticking around and I hope you’ll continue to do so in the future. Even if I am the most sporadic working rider blogger ever.

Happy Holidays from mine to yours!

Love,

The Working Rider, DH, Koramonster, Konan the Survivor, DtroublemakerC, and the Saintest of all Saints, TJ.

Colorado Day 10

Day 10 was all about redemption.  I woke up with an “I AM NOT A TRAIL RIDER, I JUMP HORSES OVER STICKS FOR FUN AND I WILL DAMN WELL ENJOY IT” attitude.  In other words, I needed to shake off the Colorado blues, and go out and ride my best.  I felt like this was a grand plan until I walked up to the ring to inspect my courses.  It was handy day in the A/Os, which is a class that I can either nail, or completely blow.  It never seems to be anything in between for me. 

The day was set up with no warm up, and the handy going first.  As I looked at my courses, and the jumps in the ring, my hands literally started to sweat.  I was staring down my biggest fear of all, which is a canter directly away from the in gate to the DREADED hay bale jump.  On the bright side it was not astroturf.  On the not so bright side, DC and I have a history of jumping hay bales which is not pretty.  I don’t know why, but he finds them to be the SPOOKIEST kind of jump out there, second only to giant astroturf walls.  

UGHHHHHHHHH. 

I think at that moment my text to Matt read something incoherent like.

Haybales, ring, canter, handy, 911 911 911 911. 

I’m only exaggerating the appropriate slight amount. 

His response?

You own the haybales. 

At this point I feel as though the haybales own me and not vice versa, but I’m glad someone is confident. 

I toddled around basically doing nothing except thinking about the dreaded haybales until it was time to show.  One track mind.

When I did finally get on, DC felt absolutely great.  We had experimented with a different hoof packing and a little bit of electrolyte and vitamin paste, and honestly I felt like he was moving and feeling about 100% times better than the day before.  He was never ever sore or off, but his body just felt looser and more comfortable.  The technical footing is great for being all weather, not so great for feet. 

After warming up, I walked up to the ring, took a deep breath, and was sent off with a typical Mattism “Have fun rider.”  I stepped into the ring, and immediately picked up a beautiful right lead for an approach to the DREADED hay bales.  Good canter, good canter, there it is, the jump, there it is, slightly gappy DC jump NOW.  And jump he did. 

I know, it seems like I’m making a bigger deal out of these haybales than they ended up being, but honestly, it’s 80% a mental game for me, and this was a moment that I FREAKING CONQUERED.  After that, the world was my oyster.  I had a lovely left lead roll back to an Oxer, a fantastic inside turn to a vertical in of a line, followed by another lovely right lead roll back.  Next was an inside turn up the inside line, to an immediate left hand turn to the trot jump (trotting only 5 feet away, go me).  The finish was a long bending line, I was a little close coming in and a little long coming out, but quite honestly it was hands down the best trip I had turned in in Colorado.  I even got a whistle from Matt.  Whistles are hard to earn.  As I walked out of the ring, he says to me “Haybales, owned.”  Truer words could not have been said.

My second trip was also quite good, though I did have one bugger of a swap to a left lead line.  But overall, super.  I jogged 2^nd and 3^rd.  Well, I jogged, DC dolphined, played, squealed, and then took at least 5 normal trot steps so the judge could watch.  Thank God. 

Someone was both feeling super proud of himself, and super good.  

For me, I actually managed to jump my horse over sticks in a reasonable way, which seems to be the singular goal.

Colorado Day 9

So yeah, I was all caught up and stuff, and then…..well…I wasn’t.

So therefore, I’m very late with this blog, and the rest of the blogs that are to come. But hey I’m sure someone out there is still reading right?

Day 9 started as a fairly unremarkable with hardly any emotional shenanigans from yours truly.  Sadly it did not end that way. 

I arrived at the show at a very reasonable hour of 9 am, with plans to once again do a little watching, a little shopping, and a lot of reveling in the amazing Colorado weather.  I succeeded in doing much of the above, including playing with a French bulldog puppy at one of my favorite show vendors Exceptional Equestrian.  http://exceptionalequestrian.com/  Seriously, this woman gives me a bad addiction for all things cute and unnecessary in my life.  And she has a puppy.  I think it’s a marketing ploy. 

I also got to watch TJ bring home his second champion in rusty stirrup in as many weeks. 

When it was time to finally get on I decided to play it smart, and load myself up with my ring side back pack (a new addition to my showing necessities that I now cannot live without), throw a cooler on DC, and hand walk him up to the ring.  It only took me two weeks, but finally the light bulb went off.  Walk the horse to the ring, and eliminate all stress of back and forth!  Well, it almost worked; we only ended up heading back to the barn one singular time due to ring delays and a trainer that was supposed to be in 4 places at once. 

Regardless, we stood nicely and quietly waiting for our rotation.

By nicely and quietly I mean the typical “hi my name is dc, hi you over there what you doing, can I play with your bag, how about the sponge, I like sponges, do you have a whip, I play with whips, I like to bite, here I’ll bite your water bottle, yes so fun yes hi.”  There is a reason holding DC at the ring can seem like a bad idea.

Our warm up was honestly less than stellar.  I just didn’t feel exactly on my A game, and as we all know feeling on my A game doesn’t always result in amazingness so I was a bit concerned about what our trips would be like.  And honestly, they were another group of just ok.  And I was awarded with…..just ok.  4ths and 5ths abounded. 

One fact about me is that I am NOTORIOUSLY hard on myself.  I really want to do well, and ride well, and WIN ALL THE RIBBONS.  And once again in as many weeks as there had been horse shows, I simply let myself down.  I’d like to say that I went on with a devil may care attitude, but in reality I was seriously contemplating taking up trail riding.  I mean I’d never take up tennis, I lack the eye hand coordination, but I bet I’d be one fierce trail rider.  Matt somehow managed to talk me down off my ledge of my new found goal of trail riding excellence. 

I took the rest of the afternoon to watch some of the Woodhill riders, and catch up with the working student at Woodhill, Miguel.  Miguel is one cool kid who works very hard to have opportunities to ride, doing anything he can for more time around horses.  As we were sitting there chatting, he says to me “I have a confession to make.”  I’m thinking “ok this is about to get awkward.” Then he says “I read your blog, and I love it.”  Well…don’t I just feel famous now???  If Miguel is reading my blog, that means maybe some other cool junior kids are too.  Or at least they were until I didn’t write for 20 or so days.  Oops.  

Colorado Day 8 – 4th of July!!!!

Look how almost caught up I am!

First I have to say.  I love 4^th of July.  I love summer, I love fireworks, I love watermelon, I love America!!!!  Ok love fest over, but really, 4^th of July is probably my most favorite holiday.  I even have nails in support of the Red White and Blue.

On my flight to Denver that morning, there were four members of the Armed services on the plane.  The pilot took the time to honor their service, and spoke to the spirit of 4^th of July.  Pretty cool. 

Sarah picked me up from the airport and we headed directly to the show.  My only agenda for that day was to school DC, but somehow managed to pass the time with various antics such as….

Admiring TJ’s equal love for the 4^th.

Can’t you tell how enthused he is?

And holding Luna for Courtney

Courtney and her sister Madelyn are two of the girls that ride at the barn TJ was located for his previous lease.  I got to know that entire barn family pretty well, and they often referred to me as an associate barn member.  Since the two girls wanted to do some out of state showing this summer, I recommended coming along for some fun in Colorado with Matt.  They came for the last two weeks, and I can't wait to hang out with them!  Goofy, fun, and loveable are the three adjectives that come to mind when I think of these two gals.  (yes they read this blog, yes they might have bribed be to say awesome things about them, but yes, it's all true nonetheless). 

I finally got on DC in the late afternoon, moseying on up to the warm up ring to do a little schooling.  For this week, Meghan, Matt’s assistant, had gone home, so Matt was alone with 21 horses, 14 riders, and 7 different rings.  It was going to be a busy weekend for sure.  Matt was signed up to do the Ride and Drive which was of course starting right at the same time that I was supposed to school DC.  We put our patient hats on and proceeded to wander around the show grounds waiting for the walk to be completed. 

When Matt made his way back to our warm up ring, he was dressed to impress with a 4^th of July shirt that was not to be believed (more on that later).  We schooled beautifully, and didn’t want to spend too much energy, so at six jumps we called it a day.

The Ride and Drive is a super crazy fun event that they do in CO one week each year.  The horse jumps a series of 1 meter jumps, any knock downs are added as 4 seconds to the time.  Then the rider jumps off the horse, jumps down a bank, through a set of military style tires, and then on a golf cart navigates a course of golf cart jumps, water, reverse, and cones.  I wish I would have thought to take a video, but at least Phelps Media got a great pic.

That shirt y’all.  That shirt. 

I actually considered doing this with TJ, but I didn’t perhaps think it would be his best set up for rusty stirrup……so I remained a spectator.

After that, Courtney, Madelyn, Sarah, and I all took our horses out for a graze.  I tried really hard to get all four in one pic, not so successfully.

But I did get an awfully cute one of yin and yang hanging out together.

That evening I met up with some friends for dinner and a few fireworks, excited about showing over the weekend, but mostly excited about FIREWORKS.  I really do love fireworks.

Colorado Day 7 – Rain rain go away!

In my last blog I mentioned an evening of winding down at a campfire in the camper park.  By winding down what I really meant was sipping on wine until 1 am swapping stories about showing in days of yore.  It was a good time, and sooooo worth it to get my mind off my aforementioned awful riding. 

However.

The next morning my 7am to the show call did not look so good on me.

That is officially my “I’m the luckiest girl in the world and I wouldn’t trade what I’m doing for anything else” look.  I swear that was exactly what was on my mind.  You might ask where exactly I took this picture.  Well I couldn’t bear the idea of going straight to the show without a morning wake me up chai, so I stopped at Panera.  My stop at Panera ended up being an hour long pep talk of how much I love doing this, and how I needed to get my butt to the show.  It took a while, but it worked. 

First order of priority that morning was to purchase Himalayan salt blocks for my boys.  Yes. They are spoiled.  Yes. I bought them salt blocks for their show stalls.  No. I don’t mind the fact that I was hanging DC’s in his stall he just about pushed me down in excitement to get to his precious block of salt.

He has a serious obsession.

I spent some time at the show watching a few rounds, looking at my photos (the photog got some GREAT ones), and finally going up to the jumper ring to watch the group of Junior jumpers from my barn go.  Since Matt had a little down time in between the Junior Class and the Low A/Os, I took the opportunity to pick his brain on my anxiety and riding issues from the day before.  I think that being a trainer must be one of the more complicated jobs in the world.  Human emotions, horse emotions, equine welfare, sports psychology, and riding all rolled into one. 

Unfortunately the break in time between classes meant that Matt had a direct conflict with my division.  The “plan” went something like this.

Go first go first in the division! HURRY GET ON NOW.

No, wait, he can’t make it down, go back to the barn.

OMG he has a break HURRY GO BACK TO THE ARENA.

Nope, sorry not going to happen, you’re on the list for last now.

With as many back and forths, I had plenty of time to snap a pic of his adorable blue braids and head puff.  Who says hunters can’t have fun?

Hurry up and wait is a particular specialty of mine.  Fortunately, my friend Zheila came to watch and keep me company.  We chatted for a bit, when she said to me, “you know that storm behind you, it looks kind of nasty.”  Um, what storm?  I turn around.  Oh THAT storm.  As we the division was winding down, the wind started picking up and things started to look really bad. 

I hopped on DC and got exactly 4 warm up jumps done when they called the show for a weather break.  UGHHHHHHHH  This was the third time I took my horse back to the barn in one day!  Poor DC.  On the bright side he sure did look pretty with the stormy background.

Sooooo I hung out at the barn for another eon (hour) before the storm passed and we were able to start again.

DC felt really pretty good in the warm up, considering all of the back and forth and waiting, I was honestly fairly pleased.  For the show I had two hunters and a second classic round.  It was one of those days where simply SOMETHING happened on each course.  Our first course we had a smashing round going and then on the long approach to the oxer a banner flapped right as we were at the base of the jump and DC jumped more sideways than straight and over.  On our second course a girl fell off in the ring next to us with a whole lot of yelling and people screaming whoa, I can only imagine the horse was running around wildly never to be caught.  It distracted BOTH of us (concentration is key) and left a meh of a line, scoring a 76.  The last course the line closest to the gate DC somewhat decided an early exit might be the key to being the winner.  This gave us a huge drift to the left and a crooked jump coming in, and scoring a 78.  So, we ended up with blah, bleck, and blah. 

It’s not to say that those weren’t respectable scores, just nothing that’s going to leave me with blue ribbons raining down in a parade like setting. 

I WANT A PARADE LIKE SETTING.

Spoiled?  Nah. 

So, the second week of Colorado wrapped with some good, some bad, some really not good, but overall still the most fun show I’ve attended.