When my ground crew started coming with for moral support, and then when we started taking Milton places overnight, I stopped. Why advertise that the house is empty?
Do I think nefarious villains are stalking me though my blog? No. Well, now that I write it out, a little. It would make a good NCIS/Criminal Minds/whatever plot. Weirder things happen every day. But I digress.
Do I think we have anything worth stealing? No. Everything in our house is useful, sentimental, or covered in pet hair. Or a combination of all three.
So why do I worry? What can I say. I grew up in a big city. I am defensively paranoid by nature.
Thus ended the Show-Today-post tradition.
Last Saturday [You Are Not Going To Believe This], I resurrected the idea for the reasons stated, namely that the day was a victory before we ever entered the ring. I thought some folks might want to cheer us on in real time (Hi Mom!), so I gave the exact time of our test. I even added the displacement from GMT, lest there be any doubt.
Brilliant move. I manage to alert to the entire world to the exact time that our house would be unattended. I did not realize this until the post was published and & it was too late.
Oops.
As it turned out, no one ravaged our house while we were gone. Plus, on Saturday morning, it gave me something to worry about other than the horse show.
I now return to announcing horse shows in retrospect.
A word about tack. Schooling bridle and “illegal” bit. If Rodney decided he hated showing, I didn’t want to invest in new bridle & bit. Got permission ahead of time from the judge to use the driving bit that Rodney goes in. Bit with the same mouthpiece and dressage/hunter-compatible sidepieces has been ordered.
Also, please forgive the green slime. The bit was clean when we started.
1.
A Enter working trot rising.
Between X&C Medium Walk.
6.5
Slightly right on center line.
Here we go!
5.
C Circle left 20 meters, working trot rising
5.5
Circle (a) bit small
Number on my boot rather than on his bridle. Rodney can be headshy about some things, i.e. brushes, unexpected movements, but tolerant of others, i.e. towels, skritches, hoses. Now was not the time to find out what he thought of piece of cardboard near his eye. Another option is to pin it to his saddle pad.
Same movement
Someone decided to make it a stretchy circle. I have no memory of this. I was trying to steer, and not very well apparently. I thought we nailed it. Usually my navigating/precision is better than this. At the Intro level, it’s all one has.
7.
H-X-F Free walk
6.0
Needs more march & swing
Nor do I remember him looking out of the arena. This may be about where I was hunting a horse fly that was circling us.
Same movement
8.
F-A Medium walk.
A Down centerline.
5.5
Counterbent through corner & turn.
Yeah, he’s bad to drop onto his right shoulder. I worked on making a clear transition from free walk to working walk, but neglected to get the horse straight. OTOH, check out my German Army officer dressage position!
9.
X Halt and Salute
7.0
Good boy! I made sure to salute first.
Rodney’s Posse is ready for new adventures. Jeremy Villar Photography (border added)
Now that Rodney has been to a show, we are treating it a beginning rather than a bizarre one-off. The ability to go places and to show opens up many possibilities.
Local dressage is an easy first step. As many of these as we can find. Every chance to go in the ring is a chance to absorb the show environment. However, we run out of them fast. If we are willing to drive 2-3 hours, there are shows throughout the year at Popular Place and Chat Hills. If we are traveling that far, I want to be doing more than a single walk-trot test. At least be doing two classes, preferably ones that include cantering. We will also need to discover how he is at a showing without multiple schooling trips to acclimate to the grounds beforehand.
When I started with Previous Horse, in another time and place, we could go to a hunter show and do all of the under saddle classes from Tiny Trotters to Working Hunter. The rules around here preclude that, at least if I want to stay eligible for the lower height jumping classes.
Speaking of jumping. It’s still on the list. Always has been. If Rodney – or Milton, for that matter – could hop quietly over, say, 2’6″ to 3″, we could endlessly amuse ourselves at events and hunter/jumper shows.
Jumping with Rodney has a steamer trunk full of baggage. What if we try and it goes badly, again [Recap]? What if jumping is out for him? I’m not going handle that piece of information with dignity. So I want everything to be optimal for our next attempt over fences. Right now that means a new saddle.
The Wintec [Saddle] comes with interchangeable gullets to widen or narrow the saddle as needed. Rodney has switched from the gullet that fit at first to a wider one [Evil Twin]. Unfortunately, the gullet system assumes that a wide horse is a barrel-shaped horse, i.e. no wither to speak of. High-withered horses are assumed to be narrow. Usually, this is the case. My wide horse has a wither that rises out of his back like a shark fin. Saddle searching is underway.
He jumped once over Milton’s crossrail at Stepping Stone Farm at the end of last year [What’s Been Happening]. He got himself in a state. Was it an I-love-jumping, excited state or an I-hate-this, excited state? Data is too limited to determine.
Meanwhile, I’ve been found a possible instructor for Rodney, a local event trainer who I have know for ages, from way back when I was taking lessons with Previous Horse. With Milton, their name never bubbled to the top of the list. I’m not sure why. When I saw them during schooling trip to FCHP, I immediately thought, ‘That would be the perfect person for Rodney.’ We’ve talked. Out of town this week. (At the AECs. Sniffle. [Countdown]) We’ll set up a time when they return.
At the moment, I am more interested in lessons than in possible shows. For example, the transition to trot can be a bit of a lurch. If I can zen my way through the first moments, we’re good. I will often rest my knuckles on his neck when I ask for the trot to remind myself to stay calm and wait. At the first the trot in warm-up at the show [Report], he took the usual first step or two, then I felt him click into gear. I felt him think, ‘Oh yeah, the trot we had at Stepping Stone. No problem. Got it.’ I think a little bit of schooling will go a long way with this horse.
And finally, the art commission email has been sent. “If Rodney sets a hoof in a show ring, any ring, I will commission an artwork of flying pigs wearing iceskates while singing.” [A Radiance of Ribbons]
Elite show horses need to get used to posing for post-show photo sessions.
Job one. Get to know my horse.
Now that Rodney is getting less disturbed about life, I am meeting the horse underneath the hysteria. Please understand that I mean ‘less-disturbed’ for a high-strung, Thoroughbred definition of the term. Rodney is never going to be an easy ride.
Over the years, I have gotten used to thinking of Rodney as anxious and timid. The anxiety is real, for him [Weekend Report]. The timidity comes because the anxiety makes him concerned about new things. But not all new things. He’s can be weirdly bold [XC Sorta].
Remove – or reduce to manageable levels – the anxiety and the timidity goes with it. Well, hello there.
I’ve always know Rodney had an underlying confidence in himself. It was obvious the first time I saw him, years before he came to live with us [HI: The Horse Next Door]. I have nothing against arrogance in a horse. Previous Horse was utterly certain he was the center of the universe, or at least of the parts that mattered, which if course meant the parts that concerned him.
That confidence hasn’t been much in evidence over the last nine (!) years. I want Rodney to be confident. I want him to believe in himself. Does that make him sassy? Great. This is this attitude I hope to tap into as our show career progresses (!!!). I shall have to become the rider he needs in order to manage it.
I’m finding out that Rodney also has a temper. During our most recent ride at Stepping Stone Farm, Rodney stumbled for a step in the canter. Then, he threw his body about as if it was MY fault that he tripped. He seems to get mad as he gets tired &/or feels mentally pressured. A bit of easy trotting put him back in a better mood.
At the show [Report], I felt the kettle start to boil over during our last trot in warm up. He was telling me ‘Enough!’ So, we went back to walking for the time remaining and took our tour around the outside of the arena on a long rein. That seemed to restore his mental equilibrium.
In his defense, he may get mad but a) he’s fair about it and b) he gets over it. It is his way of saying that he feels he’s working too hard. He has a point. Given the amount of work he’s done, I have to be careful not to get caught up in the excitement of riding my horse and thereby asking for too much/too long.
The new, improved Rodney can also be pushy. After our test, he marched me all over the showgrounds, having a bite of grass here, a bite of grass there, and another bite from that tuft way over there. I tried to stop to talk to someone. Nope. Rodney was on the move. “I was a good horse. I can do anything I want and you’re not going to stop me.’ He was right.
Rodney
Class 3 – 2019 USDF Intro Test A – Adult, 5th of 6, with 60.938%
Highest score: 7.0
Lowest score: 5.0
Results FCHP Shows Jeremy Villar Photography
Done! Jeremy Villar Photography (border added)
How Did That Happen?
After Rodney cantered so calmly and quietly, the idea was proposed that we take him to the next Full Circle show. Do a short, simple test. See how he feels about horse shows.
We took it step-by-step. Several trips to acclimate him to the show grounds. Several trips to Stepping Stone Farm. Picking a test about which the rider would have zero stress level.
No red flags sprung up. Time to move forward. How would he react to a show environment? How would he react to being in the show ring? We had no idea. Only one way to find out.
As It Happened
We planned our work; worked our plan.
Got to show early. Took him on two long hand walks to check everything out. Had a chance to walk about the empty dressage arena. Gotta love a schooling show. He looked at this. He looked at that. Overall, he kept calm but startled more easily about little things.
A little more than an hour before our ride time, Rodney long-lined for 15 minutes. In the rain, God bless my wonderful groom. Took a little longer than it might have since I completely messed up reassembling the bridle after cleaning it. Goes on the last hole. Wait, that doesn’t look right. The other last hole.
Tacked up. Horse walked down to warm-up while rider made a stop in the little blue hut of nerves. I don’t know the exact time, but it was well over 1/2 an hour before our test, probably closer to 45 minutes, That’s a lot of warm-up for a 3-4 minute test that is essentially two trot circles. We needed every minute of it.
We really had no idea what he would be like when I got on. I kept telling myself that if he was too anxiety-ridden to listen, I would get right back off.
He was okay. Wouldn’t hold a stand, but would walk carefully around the warm-up. Rationally, I knew I needed to put my leg on. Emotionally, that was not happening. A lot of saddle seating done in those first minutes.
Eventually, I could put my inside leg on for serpentines & circles. I kept walking and kept the faith that the trotting would happen. It did. More walking. Some standing. The space between stopping the anxiety and starting to tire is not wide right now. By the end of warm-up I was running out of quarter. Good thing we only had one test.
I let him walk on the buckle around the arena and in we went.
How Did He Feel About What Happened?
Rose to the occasion. The test was noticably better than the practice ride we did two weeks earlier. Yes, it was still full of bumps and lurches. At one point, I settled him so much be came back to the walk. At another time, he kicked up sand, which hit the boards, which spooked him. I think that’s where the test sheet says I pulled him into the transition.
We went in the ring. We did the test. Marbles were retained. There is the distinct possibility that Rodney might actually enjoy being a show horse.
How Do I Feel About What Happened?
Emotions are weird. I expected to be doing more handsprings. It’s as if a cantankerous part of me is saying, ‘You have a horse. You took him to a horse show. Isn’t that how this is supposed to work?’ I have to shake myself to remember that it took us nine years to get to this simple point.
Last weekend, friends who are bead artists pried me out of the house planned a trip to a local bead show. Since the endless maw that is daily content must be fed, I figured I’d find horse-themed beads to buy and use as blog fodder. Ha!
Animals shapes were abundant: turtle, bee, gecko, scarab, fish, butterfly, starfish, dragon, peacock, frog, bird, dolphin, monkey, lion, owl, whale, dragonfly, dog, & elephant. So many elephants. This was the closest I could come to “horses.” From Beads & Rugs By ATA, Paducah, KY, Facebook.
Copper, patina-ed, Greece
Melted coin silver, Greece
Actually, that’s not completely true. There were palm-sized brass horse silhouettes decorated with semi-precious stones. Pretty. $175 each. There was an undecorated version on the same table. I did not ask the price. I love y’all, but not that much.
Virtual Brush Box 