PrintAfter a week of the usual pre-clinic chaos—lame horses, sick riders, people who can't get their trailers out because of an inability to operate a shovel—Lendon called me at noon on Friday to inform me that all of New England was getting whomped by—Surprise!—an epic snowstorm. Her flight had been cancelled, and when Lendon Gray, a tough-as-nails Mainer, says the weather is cataclysmic, I believe her.
Rather than try and patch together a one-day clinic, we vowed to reschedule for March. And instead of throwing the whole weekend away, I patched together a hail-Mary Open House on the farm for Saturday. We had chili ready to go, so what the heck? I worked four horses, answered questions and had a really lovely time.
First I rode Douwe the Friesian, and he was terrific. His back is a tricky saddle-fitting shape, and between that and the fact that he's changed SO much since he's been here, we haven't gotten him a saddle of his own yet. It's meant playing musical saddles with what we've got here, and this week I made a really good switch to something he seems to like more than anything else we've tried. As a result, he's been very, very good in the work—transitions between trot and canter improving, a little easier to keep uphill in the trot. All good stuff. I've opened the door to the counter-canter, which is improving his balance quite a bit. And it was fun to answer audience questions about him, and other "off" breeds.
Next was Fender. He's been a very good boy this week, so I was curious to see how he'd do with a major change to his environment. I walked him into the indoor, and he took a look at all the people in the viewing gallery...and then sighed. Whatever. People, schmeople. Good boy!
He was great to ride. Forward, uphill. A little noodley in the bridle, which he hasn't been since the very beginning, so that's worth some exploring, but on the whole he put on a very nice show. He also opened the door for me to talk about my thoughts on young horses—how often I like to work them, what kind of work, yadda yadda yadda. And everyone told Fender how pretty he was, which he enjoyed very much.
I was very glad to have my own personal photography crew out en masse—fellow bloggers Sara Lieser and Coree Reuter—which is great because a) I love them, and b) I don't have any Fender photos, but also c) it was great to see their photos. I've been so panicked about riding Fender forward enough, but without any eyes on the ground, it's been unclear to me as to whether I've succeeded or not. Photos show that I'm actually right on the brink of running him out of balance. Hoorah for feedback!
Rode Midge next, and he was pretty good about keeping the spooking to a minimum, but was a big of a turd about the tempi changes. They're not his favorite thing, and every two weeks or so he shuts down and flips me the bird. Why do five changes? Do you not know what lead you want to be on? Pfffh. So we had a little conversation about them, then I gave him a walk break and said well, let's try and salvage this demo by doing some piaffe and passage.
And OHMYGOD! Midge was a ROCKSTAR.
He's had a few big ahas in the last week or so about the passage, and I think he understands it now. And he felt so good yesterday that I said “Hey, let's try and make a piaffe transition.” And he DID! It wasn't flawless by any means, but he kept a two-beat rhythm, kept the neck as out as his neck can go right now, and most importantly kept COOL. He even made a perfectly adequate transition back out to the passage. Sweet!
