The Green Horseman

Stanley has been making progress more and more each week despite our challenges.

He’s been starting to understand connection and self-carriage.

We found a virtual show series that is fun and affordable. We pay $15 per test and that enables us to get feedback from a judge. Thanks to our progress and breakthroughs we’ve officially made it to training level. In April I submitted Training Test 1 and Training Test 2. Stanley was a bit agitated that day. There were bugs, all the horses had been brought in for dinner, I was doing a good job of masking my own stress level but I’m sure he saw through it, and the sun was starting to set. I ended up submitting test 1 with a botched left lead. Nevertheless, we were able to scrape together a 60 and a 62 in those tests. A great place to start.

As you learned from Navigating Greif: Finding Strength to Heal my father passed on May 9th. I was 8 hours from home and had stayed the night in his house but decided to come home the next day. I needed my friends, my animals, and I needed Zac. That same weekend I had worked with a friend on organizing a clinic at our farm hosting Jessica Van Eyck. It was a clinic we began planning in December/January and the timing couldn’t have been worse for me at this point; but you can never truly know. I am SO grateful I had a great partner to organize the clinic with.

I first had the pleasure of auditing and photographing a Jessica clinic last year (Learnings and Outings). Jessica is a USDF gold medalist and a certified instructor through fourth level. She also came to our club’s year end banquet as a keynote speaker. My work with the clinic was done early on; I organized dates and worked as the clinic secretary. My job was to make the schedule and ensure our registrants submitted their documentation. I was able to help people remotely. I signed up in hopes to ride but as time went on I didn’t believe I’d be able to make the day work. I was at peace with that; my friend was more than happy to help run the day of tasks.

Since I came home Saturday, I was in town Sunday… the day of the clinic. In a fog of grief and relief I decided to ride. Stanley was very tense. He wanted to do all the right things, but we were getting what felt like new instruction. It was a masterclass on inside leg to outside rein. Something we all know yet it felt SO INTENSE. At the end we were exhausted, but it felt great; I was able to ride with Jessica! I thought I had performed very poorly, yet watching video replays it really wasn’t as bad as I thought.

Two days later we enjoyed a lesson with our coach. Stanley was soft, relaxed, and remembered EVERYTHING we learned from Sunday. I was smiling ear to ear. I needed that!

On Thursday I filmed the Training 1 and Training 2 tests for our MAY virtual show. It was good practice as I needed to remember these tests for an IN PERSON show I signed up for the following Sunday. It was a HOT day so I rode each test on the first take. He was being gracious, and I had no need to keep trying for better tests. In the second test Stanley must have gotten a bug in his ear as we picked up the right lead canter towards the end; he was shaking it relentlessly but still trying his heart out for me. The entries are due tomorrow (25th) so I won’t have results for another week or two.

On Sunday I took Stanley to Larkin Hill where we both debuted the Training level Test 1 and Test 2 IN PERSON for the first time. I’ve never ridden a test above intro; with Nahe we could have but we kept out combined tests to 2′ which was ALWAYS intro. Stanley arrived and immediately took to grazing. We walked him around the facility first to give him a look. We then tacked up and I casually made my way to the indoor arena to warm up. He was calm and relaxed. We picked up our left lead on the first try. I was elated.

When it was time for our test we strode in and made our way to the judge, introduced ourselves, and began test 1. We had some tension (I know it’s likely ME) but we rode well. We had a mishap in the left lead and rode nearly the full circle before picking up the correct lead. The rest of the test I felt rode well. Stanley was slightly tense and not very focused, but he wasn’t stressed or over his threshold.

After two other riders we walked back into the arena to ride Test 2. This time the test rode much better. We got our correct leads and although we had some tension it was already much more improved than the previous ride. I was incredibly proud as we walked RELAXED out of the arena.

My only goal for Suday was to give Stanley a positive experience. We were very successful in that. He had a good day, wasn’t overstimulated, and we left in good spirits. Our judge wasn’t very impressed with us, we got a 3 for our bad lead and a 58 for the first test…60 for the second. I thought our canter departs were decent, but we got 5.5s. We did however get 7.0s and 7.5s for our free walk and our first and last salutes in the second test.

I have been diligent to try introducing Stanley back into the world in a more thoughtful way. Last year we did western dressage and took a lot of the tension out of the equation. This year I hope to do just that but with slightly higher expectations. Little by little I want him to be the confident and RELAXED horse I know he can be. This was a great start.

The following day I put Stanley’s jump saddle on and decided to school some jumps. I’ve only jumped him 2 or 3 times so far this year and the longer I go without doing it the more I fear it. Having the security of friends around me I decided to have a go. I began as I normally do. I schooled X rails in both directions. Then a small vertical. Usually, my next jump would be a small oxer. It took several minutes to vocalize it to the group I was riding with. I was teaching myself to be less passive in my voice. Instead of saying “I think I’m going to try jumping that” I spoke up and said, “I’m going to jump that next.” Then I did it…I did jump a small oxer. It was an excellent start.

I looked at another jump set slightly higher (maybe a full 2″ or 2’3″) and had a solid wall as filler. I wanted to crawl back into myself and say I think I’d like to try this. I knew we could and were 100% capable of it. We were both physically ready for it, and mentally ready for it. Or was I? This time I told Suzanne…I feel like I’m ready to jump that wall, but if you think otherwise, I’m open to your opinion. I wanted the validation.

Do it, she said.

We trotted over the cross rail and picked up the right lead canted to travel around the corner and across the diagonal to the wall. As I began to travel the diagonal towards the fence Stanley picked up his head and started bouncing. I circled. I came around again, and the same thing. Three times. He might have been confused but I know he read me. My seat MUST have been freezing up on him and my jaw must have locked because he called me out on it. We tried a fourth time and this time my hips moved forward, and Stanley did too. We leapt the wall.

But I don’t remember breathing or the moments before and during that jump. My spirit departed my body. After giving Stanley a well-deserved breather, I told my friends that I needed to do it again to confirm with myself that I in fact CAN jump that wall and do it consciously.

As we came off the wall and onto the diagonal I felt Stanley’s head come up. I told him “don’t do that let’s go” and instead of my defensive pulling back I gave him MORE rein. He softened, quieted and looked ahead. Together we rode toward the wall and my spirit stayed inside as we jumped. We knocked a rail but we did it all calmly and confidently. As we landed and came around the corner I chose to jump the oxer successfully and call it a day.

We have grown so much.

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For the bad news….the very next day Stanley and I had a terrible ride. It didn’t even happen. We warmed up and he was so beside himself that I got off. He was flailing his head, not connecting, and acting like a horse with head-shaker’s syndrome.

I have a few suspicions about the cause, and hope that we can find a solution. There are many possible causes for this behavior. Allergies. Head-shakers. A bridle I was using on him after he broke his regular one My own tension and stress. Truth be told this past week has been the hardest so far in terms of grief. As reality sets in and the initial few days have past, I’ve had a harder time being myself. I cry daily, I can’t handle much social time, and I spend hours just sitting in one place without realizing it. Stanley feeds off me incredibly well…for better or worse…and I am not surprised that we are having this setback as I experience grief of this level. He needed a few days off so I could gather myself.

It was ONE ride. I have given him several days off and he has bodywork scheduled for this coming week.

Stay tuned as we possibly go down a whole new rabbit hole.