The Light

by Laura Crum

We’ve been riding quite a bit this winter, as the weather has been great. 60 degrees and sunny, most days. I know we need rain, but the truth is we can’t influence the weather by wishing or complaining…so I’ve just been enjoying it. And I’ve been meditating on what is so special about these winter rides.

Its the light. Pure and crystal-clear and sharp, winter light is like no other light. Illuminating the bare trees and dark water—a chilly, brilliant sparkle. Look at the photos below, taken from Sunny’s back on a recent trail ride, as I follow my son on his sorrel horse, Henry, following our friends on two dark horses, down the side of the canyon to cross the creek at the bottom. Doesn’t the light just speak to you?

And again, riding on the beach, awash in blue-- surreal, thrilling winter light, with a breeze tossing the horses’ manes and tails around.

The above photo shows my son on Henry, riding towards Moss Landing, a small town on California’s Monterey Bay.

Of course, much as I love the winter light, I delight equally in the soft green/gold light of spring, and the mellow, full-bodied, dreamy light of summer. Oh, and I love the long, golden slant of autumn light. I cannot say that I have a favorite season. I can say that I love the brilliant light of winter.

I guess light is a subject best illustrated with images rather than words. So here are a few more winter moments from my world with horses.

My barnyard at morning feeding.

Winter roses—this is Crepuscule, that reliably blooms this time of year in my garden, shot from Sunny’s back. The name sounds ugly in English, but means “evening” in French.

My son took this photo of his horse, Henry, coming up our driveway after a ride on New Year’s Day.

Riding down the trail on my fuzzy little yellow horse on a misty day last week. The light is softer, but still has that frosty-white quality.

How about you guys? I know you live in many very different climates—is there anything special about riding in the winter for you? Or is winter just a huge negative, and riding pretty much impossible, or unpleasant at best?

My trail riding here in the winter usually gets shut down by rain. Our trails are all hilly, and if they’re wet they can be slick. And I am, let’s face it, a big baby about conditions. I want to feel safe and uhmmm, reasonably comfortable. So I won’t go riding if its too cold or very windy, or, oh well, you get it. Feel free to call me a wimp.

Today is supposed to be sunny and 65—I’m off to ride the trail that goes down the canyon to Aptos Creek (shown in the first three photos). It’s a nice ride on a reasonably warm day. Since it goes through the redwood forest, it’s a little too cool and shady most winter days. But we’re not having a normal winter (so far). And I might as well enjoy it while it lasts. Happy trails!

The Grey Horse

by Linda Benson

I’m reading Jane Smiley’s TRUE BLUE right now, which is about a grey horse that is quite lovely, except for his habit of occasionally spooking at something, as if he’d seen a ghost. I’m enjoying the book, because it reminds me of a grey horse I owned for a short while that behaved in the same fashion.

This happened many years ago, and I remember going to look at a grey horse for sale, and I was quite taken with him. He was a dark steel grey with dapples and a black mane and tail. Not a large horse, maybe fifteen hands, but he had a lovely head, was compact and put together so nicely that he’d turn heads. The kind of horse that was just balanced all over, so you wanted to keep looking and looking at him.

He was a little green, and was being ridden out in a field by a pretty good cowboy - a young man who might also want to buy him. I went because I knew the people involved, and I was also in the market for a new horse to ride. The grey gelding just glided across the field in a nice slow lope as several of us stood around and watched, and he had his feet underneath him at all times. I was quite taken with him, thinking to myself, boy, I’d sure like to own him, but surely this guy riding him will buy him.

Then, out in the middle of this plowed field with everyone watching, and in less than the blink of eye, the grey horse spooked at some unseen thing, jumped sideways and unseated the young man riding him. The cowboy didn’t lose his hat, immediately stood right back up again, reached for the reins and remounted, but was a little embarrassed because the horse had caught him (and all of us watching) totally off-guard.

Well, long story short, that cowboy passed on the horse, and because I was a bit prideful in those days and thought I could ride him, I bought the horse. He loaded right into my trailer, came home and settled in fine. He was easy to be around, easy to saddle and climb on, and never gave me a lick of trouble. At first.

After riding him a few weeks and finding him to be just fine, I hauled him a long ways to a big trail ride over by the ocean, and tied him up and blanketed him overnight while everyone had dinner and got ready for a the ride the next day. Sometime after dinner, for no apparent reason, the grey horse threw a little wing-ding fit, pulled back, didn’t break loose, but proceeded to kick violently at everything around him. He even connected with (and broke) the headlight of a friend’s truck, which we would have swore was out of reach of his back feet. The horse came unglued, causing such a ruckus that everyone in camp came over to see what was the matter. I didn't know.

I suspect now he was just upset at being tied up. Knucklehead. So it was with some trepidation that I got on him the next morning and started the ride, during which he was absolutely good as gold. We rode for most of the day - down on the beach, and on some great trails at Point Reyes. We even got a bit lost, and had to bushwhack through some narrow passages to regain the main trail – all the while this horse behaved excellently, and I got many comments on what a nice horse he was.

Well of course, I was pretty proud of myself that I had taken a chance on this horse and he was turning out so good. But the thought still niggled in the back of mind, that every time he shied or misbehaved, it came out of nowhere. And it was hard to relax on such a horse.

He continued to shy occasionally, from unknown spooks, and when he did, he didn’t jump in place, or a foot or two sideways. He was so nimble, so quick-footed, that he could almost spin out from underneath you, or jump about ten feet to the side with no provocation (that I could ever see.) Western people have a name for this kind of horse, and the nice version is “you coyote son-of-a-gun.” Basically, untrustworthy.

At that time in my life, I was a single mother of a daughter younger than ten, and my pride at being able to ride this horse (and to my credit, I did have a good seat and never came off of him) was balanced with imagining what might happen if I did fall off and get hurt. In other words, I was finally getting some sense into me.

The last straw came after a very long ride, when I’d had the grey horse long-trotting on some good trails down along the river, that I could ride to from our corrals. I’d given him a really good workout, and he was plain wore out, and so was I. We only had a short ride home on the side of a curvy busy road, maybe ¼ mile at most. Almost home, plain tired out, and again for no reason that I could see, this grey horse shied violently across two lanes of traffic in just a heartbeat. I was so mad I could have spit. He was not fresh, there was no provocation, and the horse seemed almost as if he’d seen a ghost. There were no cars coming at the time (thank God) but the entire scenario spun before me of what ‘could have happened’ if there had been any traffic at all.

I decided I could not take the chance of this unpredictable horse dumping me, even though he never had. What’s the old saying? Discretion is the better part of valor? Because I could never fully trust him, I decided he wasn’t worth the risk, because it felt like it wasn’t “if” I might get hurt on him, but “when.”

 The dark grey horse was such a looker, I knew I’d have no trouble selling him. But he certainly wasn’t a beginner’s horse, and I’d be careful who I sold him to. I put an ad in the paper, and was honest about the kind of horse he was. A man came to look at him, took a shine to him, and the horse loaded right up in his trailer. I was quite glad to see him go, and the buyer was a pretty good cowboy.

Have you ever owned a horse that you just never trusted?

Or one that you decided to part ways with before you got hurt?

The Best Presents aren’t Wrapped

I planned on posting this on Christmas day, but the time got away from me and I never did.

Over the years I’ve been married to Denny, I’ve never kept a horse at home. I’ve always boarded her. It was with some trepidation that I hauled Gailey home last September.

My former husband had grown to resent my horse and the time and money I spent with her. Though he’d originally been supportive, he’d never been overly thrilled regarding my horse addiction. I think a lot of women will agree that horses are a sore spot with their husbands in one form or another. Over the years, I think my dedication to horse and horse showing and his dedication to his boat and boating caused too many conflicts. When we finally went separate ways, we did so as friends and are good friends to this day.

When I started dating my new husband Denny, I made sure he understood that the horses and I are a package deal. He didn’t seem to mind. In fact, he jumped into the horse show life with gusto and enjoyed it as much or more than I did.

Regardless, I wasn’t sure how Denny would handle having a horse at home. We’d gotten in the habit of taking frequent weekend vacations at the spur of the moment. With a horse to care for, this wouldn’t be so simple to do.

After I brought Gailey home, I vowed to make the transition from horseless to horse-keeping as transparent as possible for my husband. The first day I came straight home from work with plans to clean the stall and paddock and feed the horse. Denny gets home a half-hour before I do. I found him in the barn, manure fork in hand as Gailey happily chomped away on her dinner. 

The next day the same thing happened, not to mention a bucket of apples from our apple trees sat near the stall.

A week later Gailey had a bout of cellulitis. I can give shots to a horse, but I’m not thrilled about it. After a few days, I just couldn’t do it anymore. Denny took over, not having any problem giving her twice daily shots. In fact, I had to go away for the weekend, and he took care of her, giving her meds and shots as prescribed by the vet. Of course, I’ll give Gailey some credit. She’s a great patient. Most of the time, you don’t even need to put a halter on her before you treat her.

It continues to amaze me that Denny is so into taking care of the horse and our little farm. He loves coming home in the evenings and taking care of the animals. I find his love of and dedication to the animals in our care is one of the greatest presents I could receive.

I hope your new year is filled with such priceless gifts and precious moments.

Breyer World

Big Bro with Little Sis with just a few of the Breyers

My little girl is all about horses. She lives and breathes horses. If she isn't with the pony or at school, she is in her room with her world of Breyer horses.

Watching her play with those models brings back so many fond memories from when I was a kid and used to do the same thing. I could be in my room by myself with those models for hours. I made up all sorts of stories that fueled my imagination. Sadly, when I went away to college my mom packed up the model horses and put the box in the garage. There were a couple of little girls who lived up the street and they discovered that box when they came down to visit the live horses living there. My dad told them that they could play with the models. I guess they interpreted that as play with them in their room at home because they all disappeared over time. That really stings now with the investment I have in the models I buy for Kaitlin. I would have loved to have given those models to my daughter. But I do hope those girls had as much fun as I did with the models.

Now that Kait has a bazillion of them and her room seemed to be shrinking, my husband built her a loft bed over the holiday break so that she had more room to play. He also built her a twelve stall barn with cross-ties and everything to boot. He is still working on getting electrical into the miniature barn. You walk into the room and Kaitlin has it all set up. She has a cross country course, arenas, pens for special horses and the barn stalls for the really special ones.

I have to admit that at first I frowned a bit. Let's face it, with age comes a desire to have your house in order and with all those models and jumps, etc on the floor in her room it isn't exactly the original vision I had for a sweet little girl's room. But after watching her and listening to her create stories around her model horses, I came to realize I wouldn't have it any other way. The facts are that Kait is going to grow up and go to college in only 7 short years. I know how quickly that time goes as I have teenage sons--oops, only one now. The other one is twenty! With that perspective in mind, I look around at the horse world now created in my daughter's room and I realize that I wouldn't have it any other way.

Cheers,
Michele
http://www.michelescott.com

P.S. My skills are quite lacking as a camera person and my cold doesn't do much for my voice, but if you would like to take a look into the Breyer World in our house then please check it out.

To Sunny

by Laura Crum

Four years ago, on New Year’s Eve, I brought home a little palomino mutt of a horse that I intended to use for trail riding. He had a few bad habits that I thought I could deal with, and he was known to be a truly solid, bombproof horse outside, which is what I was looking for. In the past four years we have been on hundreds of rides—I kept track the first year I owned him and came up with 175—for that year alone. We’ve ridden through the hills and on the beach, alone and with friends, we’ve gathered cattle and plodded through mud, crossed creeks and waded in the surf, and scrambled up some pretty tricky bits of steep, tangled, brushy trail. We’ve had a blast together and I’ve grown to love my opinionated, intelligent, sensible, lazy, and very reliable little yellow horse. Today I’m going to post some photos in honor of our partnership, showing our life together (including some from a recent winter ride on the beach). I hope you enjoy them.

Below you see Sunny at his best—mid-summer.

Sunny in his winter color. I think this horse’s personality shows perfectly in this photo.

From Sunny’s back—going through the sand dunes toward Santa Cruz, Monterey Bay to our left.

Headed down the beach towards Monterey with my son on Henry and our friend Wally on Twister.

The end of a good ride.

Going down our nearby trail through the woods.

That same trail, from a different perspective—Sunny and Henry carrying me and my son through the green world.

Below I am gazing at the Monterey Bay from Sunny’s back, looking north towards Santa Cruz. We call this place the Lookout—it is about a two mile ride from my front gate, and one of my favorite spots. The ride to the Lookout and back is the one I take most often (we did it yesterday). The trail through the woods in the previous two photos leads to this place. This is the photo we used for the new Equestrian Ink banner, but unfortunately the view of the Monterey Bay had to be cropped out to make the picture fit the banner.

Sunny turned loose to graze.

Eating breakfast in his corral.

A ride through the autumn hills.

Sunny and me in very non PC garb.

My little yellow mule.

Here’s to you, Sunny. You’ve been a great horse for me, enabling me to do just those things I really wanted to do right now. I will always be grateful to you for the gift you’ve given me. You have a forever home.

Goodbye to a Banner Year and Resolutions for the New One.

By Terri Rocovich

2011 was a banner year for me in more ways than I can count. My training and teaching business has never been healthier, my horses are healthy and happy,

my students achieved many of their goals, and

my amazing niece (who will soon be 25 and it seems like yesterday that she was 9) completed her first One Star Event.


I bought a new "horse of my dreams" - Uiver

and I made a check off my bucket list by going to Kenya.

In addition to all of the horse related joys in 2011 it was also a great year for family, friendships and just enjoying life. I guess that one of the benefits in getting older (I turned 53 just before Christmas) is that you finally realize that it is the simple things than bring the greatest joy and, when you give to others or animals you receive love and satisfaction back tenfold. That is one of the things I love about my job. I get to be a mentor and second parent to my students and not only receive the gift of their love and respect in return but also the gratitude and friendship of their parents. There are times that I complain to myself that I have little privacy, I don't set clear enough boundaries and rarely get a true day off, but when I weigh the positives and the positive impact I can have on my students it is all worth it and then some.

We all know that family can drive us crazy, and I am no different, but I am blessed with 2 sisters who support my every venture and love me unconditionally. Knowing I was going to super nervous, my sister Marta came down and spent the entire weekend of my first show with Uiver just hanging out and keeping me grounded.

So what about 2012, how will anything ever top this past year?? Who knows but all I can do is make my resolutions, plan and of course, dream big. OK so here goes -

Resolutions for 2012

1)Get better organized. My office more often than not looks like a paper bomb has gone off in it. I am open to any and all suggestions on how to make this happen. Of course there are not enough hours in the day, but I often waste time and spin my wheels looking for something buried under "to do" piles of paper. Please for those of you with God given organization skills - HELP!!!

This also includes organizing my time. I am notorious for double and even triple booking myself and over-committing myself at times to the point of burn out. The first part of 2012 is no exception. Between training, shows, speaking at the USPC Annual Meeting, The USPC National Examiners meeting and paperwork for taxes, I basically don't have a day off until April. Yikes!!!! I don't think ahead enough and always think I can do more than each day allows. Any suggestions? Perhaps commitment therapy? or maybe I should just be committed.

2)Finish my book!!!!! Michele is holding my feet to the fire on this one. She has reviewed much of what I have written so far, has given me great advice and bugs me daily about how many pages have I written. I am so grateful for this, even if it is overwhelming at times.

3) Continue my journey with Uiver. We have another show in a few weeks at Prix St. George and have started working on 2 tempis (change of lead every 2 strides) which is the next step we need for Intermediare. This isn't a resolution really, it is a joy (or for those of you who remember Disneyland in the old days - an E ticket ride) every time I ride him. Whether we go up another level or not, it is all good and I couldn't love him more.

4) Volunteer. Now, I am not quite sure how I will find the time to fit this in, perhaps when I get better organized, but I am so blessed in my own life I feel that I should be giving back more. I tried volunteering for the Humane Society a few years ago but would drive home every time in tears because I couldn't take them all home, so now I just donate. But either by helping at a homeless shelter or maybe Habitat for Humanity, I plan to do something.

5) Spend a few minutes each day just counting my blessings. I have made a conscious effort over the past several years to be more positive and to take each day as it comes. As we all know, this is easier said then done on some days but every year I resolve to keep up the process. For me it is like personal growth training. I believe in karma, the concept of "paying it forward", the power of faith and positive thought and with all the good things that happened in 2011 I have to believe it all works.

Like Alison mentioned in her post on Saturday, I wonder why I am so fortunate when so many others are enduring tough times. I don't want to tempt fate or seem ungrateful to the powers that be, so I will simply remain keenly aware and appreciative of my good fortune and, as always, pay it forward when I can.

What are your resolutions for 2012???

Top Stories of 2011

It's New Year's Eve and the local paper is filled with the top ten stories of the year both locally and globally. The earthquake in Japan, the civil wars in the Middle East, the Occupy Wall Street movement, and the US economy were all top stories. I cringingly have to admit that though all of these emotionally and mentally engaged me when I read about or heard about them in the news, my family and I were affected by none of these huge incidents. Virginia had a teeny earthquake and a teenier drought. My husband and I both have secure jobs, and my family and animals are all healthy. How are so many of us lucky enough to escape the world's turmoil? It is a question that puzzles me when I see photos of starving children and tsunamis engulfing a town.

One of the issues that didn't make the top ten was Congress lifting the ban on horse slaughter in the US. I uploaded this image because it depicts horses that were rescued before they went to Mexican slaughterhouse. In 2010, 138,000 horses were shipped to Mexico and Canada. I did not research this site/blog where the image came from, but I do know that the photos represent the many healthy horses being auctioned and sold for slaughter. The topic is a hot one and elicits much debate with pros and cons on both sides. An article in my local paper on December 11, quotes a woman in my area who wants to be able to butcher old, injured or troublesome horses in order to feed her dogs. The Virginia Horse Council feels that it is better to slaughter horses locally where the process can be regulated instead of shipping them long distances. The organization is also in favor because it hears stories of too many abandoned horses and livestock traders "locking up their trailers at auctions lest they find unwanted horses when they return." Hay prices have doubled in many areas due to drought, and the poor economy, which has made many jobless, has forced people to make a decision about their animals. A healthy, well-trained horse might find a good home. But what about older, less attractive prospects? Euthanizing a horse in VA costs about $200; laws forbid burying your horse on your property so there is then a disposal fee. Even PETA supported the repeal of the ban for slaughter in the US though many animal rights groups are pushing for a total ban on slaughter of horses here and in foreign countries.

I am on the fence. Dogs and cats continue to be abused and abandoned and then put to sleep at shelters because of owners who do not take responsibility, so it is naive to think that if there is a ban on horse slaughter, humans will stop breeding unwanted horses. I know this blog is not the place to discuss any of the top ten issues, nor do I want to get in a huge argument. But in the context of my life, I know I am blessed and lucky to be able to teach, ride, volunteer, garden, read, write and raise a healthy and happy family of humans and animals while too many are not so fortunate.