That old Kenny Rogers song came to mind today, as I was thinking over the happenings of my weekend. In terms of horses, you should never be too sure of a horse. Riding horses is always a gamble. There are no sure bets, and you can win or lose with a stroke of luck, good or bad. I always say, “That’s the way the cookie crumbled.” And there’s no predicting how events are going to go or what exactly is going to take place. I think the cards were stacked against me in the hand I was dealt on Saturday!
The day started out so promising. I planned to go back out to the residence with the black horses I had started working on (see my previous post for reference). So loaded up my assortment of bridles and saddle, a bucket of grain for treats, and my brush and curry comb. The owner, Nate, had told me that he had tried for an hour to get the bridle on his mare since I’d worked with her last, and could not succeed. So that was my first goal. He had bought a new bridle since I’d been there, and chosen a nice ring snaffle with no-pinch cheeks and copper inlays. So I presented it to the mare, who threw her nose in the air and tried to walk all over me. We finally got it on her, but it took both of us holding her head and putting the bridle on over top of her halter. I am learning just how “sour” this mare is the more I work with her!
So then I saddled her up and got on her, again being watchful of her trying to bite me when I put my foot in the stirrup. She remembered our last lesson, and just glared at me rather than actually nip, and my elbow was ready to block her if she tried it. So then I decided that rather than walk circles like we did in our first lesson, I would ask her this time for a nice trot. I gathered my reins a little, gave a forward “ck-ck-ck” command, and squeezed my calves into her sides slightly. She responded by pinning her ears, rolling the whites of her eyes at me, and reaching around to bite my foot! She didn’t actually nip me, but bumped her jaw on my left stirrup, so it really wasn’t pleasant for her. But again, I was shocked at how nasty she was, and re-evaluated my initial judgement that she would be the easiest of the two black horses to train.
So then I set a goal. I was going to keep bothering her until she agreed to trot nicely, ears up, without me having to nudge or correct her. Her reward would be no leg-squeezing, and me letting her stop and rest. So I continued to plague her with “ck-ck-ck”-ing, leg squeezes (mind you, I was not kicking her, nor was I wearing spurs), and reins very ready to correct her if she reached around to bite me. She would trot two steps, ears pinned, tail lashing, and reach to the left; I’d block her with a direct pull on the right rein so she couldn’t reach to bite me. Then she would want to stop, so I’d squeeze again and ask for forward movement, and she’d try to reach to the right to bite me on that side; so I’d block her again with direct rein contact on the left so she was not able to bite me. This did not make for a very pretty or comfortable ride. We made about ten circles around the field, stopping because she refused to go, me squeezing and clucking to make her go, and her biting at me and starting to trot again, but grudgingly and with her ears pinned at me the entire time!
I tried to be very consistent in my responses when she did actually move forward into a trot: that is, I quit any leg pressure, spoke encouragingly to her, and tried to release all rein pressure except if she was trying to bite me or I needed to gently guide her into a continued circle. Once or twice I would notice her ears come forward and she would increase speed a little, as if she was actually happy to move forward in a trot and interested in where she was headed. In those rare instances, I praised her, petted her, let her trot forward and slow down without added pressure, because I wanted to make it very clear to her that her obedience would result in a much better condition of riding all around.
Once I did get a nice smoothly trotted circle, I let her walk, asked for a stop, and petted her neck and promptly got off. I do not know how extensive this stubborn streak in her is, but she has been badly spoiled by some bad riders or complete novices, and the damage may be irreparable.
I next worked with Maverick, her stablemate, a five year old Foxtrotter gelding. Maverick is a little more shy, a little more spooky, but his owner assured me that he had been riding him some, but was not able to control him very well with the reins or get him to go in the direction he wanted. He said the horse had fifteen rides on him when he bought him. I didn’t have much time, after working so long with the mare, to ride Maverick, but I did want to test him out a little and see what we had to work with.
He stood firm when I got on, moved forward in a left arc when asked, and stopped when I asked him to. He had a smooth, springy gait which I instantly loved, and a perky attitude that made me remark to his owner that of the two horses, Maverick had the most potential. I used my new notebook analogy: Maverick is like a brand new notebook, just clean and new and perfectly ready to write his story in. Whereas Sugar is like a book that has been scribbled in, not taken care of, and bad things written in. No matter how you try to smooth the wrinkled pages or erase the scribbles, it will never look new again, and might not even be worth keeping around.
Anyway, I went back home and put my saddle away, and then got a text message from my friend JoAnn asking if I wanted to go riding. I said, “Sure!” and we agreed to meet at the farm. I went out and saddled up my buckskin mare, Penny, and when JoAnn got there we headed out through the neighboring cornfields. We had a decent ride, though it was windy and turning colder, and so we turned back towards home after about a mile or so. When we came back to the driveway of the farm, we crossed the highway, and I saw one of our barn cats there in the road ditch next to the highway. I spoke to him, saying, “Get away from the road, cat!”
We continued down the gravel road towards home, and I was turning back and calling the cat, who “meowed” back at me and started following us back towards the farm. We were about two hundred yards from the barnyard and the end of our ride, when I heard that cat come running up behind us through the grassy ditch, rustling the grass like a wild animal. I thought, “I had better hold on, and I had better turn this mare so she can see it’s only a cat,” and before I could do either of those things, she lit out in a big jump forward and then bucked, heels in the air. I was off and midair, watching hard-packed gravel road come up to meet me.
I always jump right up when I fall off. But this time I tried, and I could not. I said to JoAnn, “I’m fine, I think. I just need to lay here for a little bit.” My mare was walking home, pretty unconcerned after realizing the boogeyman behind us was just a cat. But she was tripping on her reins and I was worried she’d break them or hurt her mouth, so I got up. I could not catch up to her at a walk, I hurt so bad. I finally caught her back at the barn, pulled my saddle off, and turned her loose and drove home. I took a long bath with some Epsom salts and went to bed.
Sunday morning I thought I might not ever ride again, I was so sore. But we went to church and it got a little easier to walk, and after lunch we went out to the farm to work for the afternoon. I walked around and gathered up fallen limbs and piled them to burn sometime after it rains, and just moved at a slow pace and started feeling a whole lot better. And today, Monday, I’m almost feeling back to normal, just bruised up a bit. I figured it’s been nine years since I’ve been bucked off, that was back before I had kids, and I probably had a lot more muscle and was more fit…I am starting to realize what it feels like to get old!
I just couldn’t believe that I had ridden two unknown horses that day, without a problem, and then my good old riding mare that I ride all the time bucked me off! Twenty steps from home! And I couldn’t believe the cat, whose life I was trying to save by calling it back away from the highway, would come running up and scare my horse! I can’t believe that Penny, who doesn’t spook at anything, would buck like that! But we have been graining the horses pretty strong, and they are starting to feel ornery—I have seen old Cricket girl running and bucking in their pen. So that’s a contributor, too. I was also dismayed because I was thinking that Penny was coming along so well and was ready for Cowboy Dad or the kids to start riding her….and now I’m re-thinking that!
And another contributing factor was that I had lengthened my stirrups the last time I went riding with JoAnn, because I got a cramp in my leg and it would not go away, so I let my stirrups out longer to relax my calf muscles. I don’t know if I could have stayed on Penny even if I had my stirrups shorter where I usually have them, but them being long made me lose them immediately and I was just off into the air without a chance of staying with her. But what bad luck, and strange coincidences that contributed to the whole occurrence!
And that’s why I’m humming that old Gambler song. I don’t think it’s a horrible thing that Penny bucked me off (though I wish it had happened in the soft cornfield rather than the packed gravel road!), and I’m not going to get rid of her because of it. I think it’s just a lesson for me to not get too comfortable with a horse that I think I know well. Every rider needs to stay aware of the situation, be ready to hang on, be quick to gain control of your horse…because every horse could buck, at any given moment, and accidents happen no matter how careful you are. Just do the best you can with what you are given, and don’t count a ride over until you’re safely back at the barn. There’ll be time enough for countin’ then.
