My youngest daughter, Birdie, diagnosed with a tethered spinal cord, needed spinal neurosurgery—in the midst of the pandemic—weeks after her first birthday. One thing I felt at the time, and have noted since: The hardest thing for parents to bear is not being able to take on or carry the burdens and struggles our children face. 

Fast forward to the 2024 Devon Horse Show, and Birdie, then 5, came in fourth in the crowded leadline class, in a side-saddle no less. Thanks to the brilliant team at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, she has a great prognosis for a full, happy, healthy life. 

However, my adage about how hard it is to be witnesses to, rather than salvation from, the suffering our kids have to endure came back to haunt me in the family class: A mere eight hours later in my marathon “Smith Girls Do Devon” Day, I was thrilled coming off a lovely third-place hunt teams round with friends from River Hills Foxhounds (Pennsylvania), and my older, 8-year-old daughter Daley was excited to make her Devon Horse Show debut in the family class with me. (Note: Why does Devon schedule the parent/child and family classes for the very end of the night, after the hunt teams and rarely starting before 10:30 p.m., well past their youngest participants’ bedtime?)

My horse, my family, and I are much more at home in the foxhunting field, or in a side-saddle race, than in the Dixon Oval at Devon. We are not horse show people; I don’t usually count strides. I have a demanding full-time job and two young children, so I really don’t have time to hone this craft. As a woman nearing 40, I’m comfortable embracing my imperfections. Nonetheless, each year I take two “fix me please” lessons from Michael Henaghan that he begrudgingly squeezes into his schedule when I call him in a panic two weeks before Devon. The week of last year’s show, I was more confident in the likelihood of Daley catching the correct lead going to the right than me. 

We didn’t have grand aspirations—or even a long-term plan—for entering the Devon family class. Kate Kocher of Springhouse Farms lent Birdie a beautiful homebred pony for leadline, and while we were practicing there, Daley fell in love with an aged paint pony, Bingo, that Kate once rescued off a dealer truck and rehabbed into the ultimate lesson and foxhunting mount. Friends Amy Magee, Holly Bernhard and Cindy Buchanan, side-saddle fairy godmothers to many, provided all kinds of pint-sized habits and appointments for Daley. With a mount, the tack, the trailer already going, my horse already being there from hunt teams, and the timing all aligning in a god-like way, we decided to enter the family class.

Under the spotlights of the warm-up in the Wheeler Ring, Bingo was transformed from a New Holland pity case to a dashing show cob right off the plane from England, and my aged Argentinian Warmblood, Harvey, suddenly had the commanding presence and suspension of his 6-year-old self. 

Sports psychologists say you should visualize the win, but as Daley and I walked into the Dixon Oval beaming, we actually lived the win. There is no greater high than confidently knowing you’ve won a class before it’s even ended. Your entire body hums with equal parts zen and adrenaline. Wither to wither, our charming mounts, as if tailor made for two aside ladies fitted in bespoke side-saddle habits, gracefully walked, trotted, and cantered us around in perfect sync, rhythm and pace. Our final lead and canter departure was the sticky one, and as we both landed it, in perfect timing and pace together, I turned to her and said, “Daley, you’ve got the blue. All you need to do is stay on babe!”

As I turned back and looked forward, training my eyes to the “Where Champions Meet” sign gracing the entrance to the ring, I noticed a bobble in my peripheral vision.

I looked in time to see Bingo taking a dip to the left around a patch of mulch in the ring, and in slow motion I watched Daley somersault to the ground. Side-saddle ladies are all too familiar with the term “off-side fall”, and as blood pounded through my brain, it was the first phrase in my mind. On your right side, you have no leg to support you, so a fall in that direction can be particularly harrowing. To avoid this, aside ladies rely on keeping their right shoulder square and back to stay square in a saddle, which is, admittedly, a concept difficult for an 8-year-old to grasp.

This sounds so cliché, but time froze, and I too was frozen on the spot, watching Daley lying on the ground. She took a deep breath, cried out “Mom”, and started crying, and I somehow intrinsically knew she wasn’t hurt or harmed. In a moment I was snapped back to normal human function, jumped off my 17.3-hand gray monster, which is a feat in itself, and had her in my arms. Moments later, my husband Dray was at our side, having proven himself the best jumper in our family after clearing the railing of the Dixon Oval from the box where he had been spectating, with room to spare. 

I told Daley it was proper form to wave to the crowd and walk out of the ring, but she said she hurt her thigh, so, fully bedecked like two foxhunting ladies from 1920, shuffling with my side-saddle apron trailing behind me, I carried her out of the ring in my arms like the bodyguard, my husband trailing behind, dragging my hunting whip with the lash leaving a snake like trail in our wake. As the EMTs gave her a check over, they noticed red on her forehead, and after a brief freak-out, we realized it was my red lipstick, from kissing her over and over again. 

But, as you horse people know, the night didn’t end there. 

There were braids to pull, horses to load in the trailer (Jimmy Paxson, Kate Kocher and Amanda Howe got them all hauled back to the barn for us), and by 1:30 a.m., we were finally back at home. With Daley safely tucked in bed and asleep, I poured a crisp glass of sauvignon blanc and a got a hot tub running, physically exhausted from a 20-hour long horse show day, but mentally firing like a lunatic. My mind started racing. 

So many of us sometimes grapple with the question, “Why am I putting myself (or my children) at risk every time I get on a horse?” “Why do I do this?” 

I remember, after years of infertility treatments, after holding Daley for the first time, I told my husband I was hanging up the helmet, and that horseback riding is too dangerous of a sport for a mom. But then a friend had a new horse to try … and then there was a cute gelding that needed to be exercised … and then there was an opportunity to learn side-saddle … and then an opportunity to do side-saddle racing at the steeplechases … then the horse that would never be for sale was in a tight spot, and I bought him off a phone call from a trade show floor in Chicago at a medical device conference … then he was a brilliant foxhunter and it would have been terrible for him to not do that … then an opportunity for the kids to do leadline … and an opportunity to foxhunt … and an opportunity for the kids to have a lovely foxhunting pony…

I’ve finally landed at this: We live in a world plagued by childhood depression and anxiety, where kids no longer have the opportunity to take calculated risks with consequences in an environment where they can learn how to critically think about the consequences of their actions. Horseback riding is a rare opportunity for them to gain resilience, public speaking skills, and myriad other functions that lack proving grounds in our modern society. Isn’t that what we, as parents, were put here to do? Raise our kids in ways that bolster their skills and confidence, so that when we are not there, they can forge on? 

I feel I’m a living testament to this, as a former barn rat. A few weeks ago, after a flurry of highly publicized air travel accidents, I found myself on one of the countless commuter flights I’ve been on hundreds of times before. We began to experience pretty intense turbulence, and, for the first time in my life, I felt anxious on a plane. I closed my eyes and imagined that I was on a very fresh horse in the middle of a field mastered flat race, and the jerking and dropping was my hot Thoroughbred bracing and straining to be let go to pound down the home stretch. My heart rate slowed, my breathing returned to normal, and I got off my flight 20 minutes later, firing on all cylinders, ready to pitch multimillion dollar projects for work, which seemed easy compared to the hot horse and crowded field that had existed in my mind (and admittedly, at the Cheshire Hunt Races the weekend before). 

The morning after Devon, I was greeted by more calls, texts and messages than I got on my birthday: kind thoughts, well wishes, offers for Daley to go on a trail ride on a retired lesson pony and recollections of people’s own dramatic Devon falls (I’m looking at you, Jessie Lampe). However, nothing brought the color back to my face, and color back to life in general, more than Daley waking up, eating some breakfast and asking if she would still “be allowed” to ride in the Wayne Memorial Day parade the next day “even though” she fell off at Devon.  

In the past 360 days, she has worked hard at school, made great friends, won the “best behaved on the school bus” award, entered a poetry competition, honed her craft during weekly riding lessons, leased her first pony, tended to her pet axolotl, taught her toy poodle three new tricks, and enjoyed a rowdy foxhunting season with the River Hills, Cheshire and Radnor hunts. However, if you ask her, she’ll say she has spent the past 360 days planning her redemption at Devon.  We’ll see you there: 10:20 p.m. Saturday, May 24, over Memorial Day weekend.

Sally Smith is the senior director of sales at Joule, a life science consultancy where she leads strategic growth initiatives within the biotech and pharma sector. She lives with her husband, two daughters and two poodles in a dilapidated but charming 1800s restored barn in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. A lifelong equestrian and karaoke enthusiast, Sally foxhunts with the River Hills Foxhounds and is an active member of the sporting and side-saddle community.