Can't remember how old I was but the family story goes like this... my mother was looking for me and discovered me under the dining room table in "my stall" with shredded newspapers for straw. I also had a bucket of water and a bowl of dry Quaker oats as grain. It gets worse, I used to tie a bridle on my face and use a pencil as a bit. The part that got me in trouble was I drew with crayon on the underside of the (nice) table, and created a nameplate for myself. I was so crazy I wanted not just to have a horse, but TO BE A HORSE.
-
"Your best can be worn at any length"- Jason Mraz -
I had a pony, but I still named all the big branches on the whit pine tree in my back yard and would "ride" them every day, was always trying to lunge my dog over jumps, and would constantly count strides between sidewalk cracks. actually i still kind of do that subconciously. I think I enjoyed all that more than actually riding my pony, cause I never got bucked off or run into low lying branches.Comment
-
One Sunday morning when I was ten years old I told my parents I was too sick to go to church. When they left the house I went to the garage and tried to build a horse out of my fathers scrap lumber. When they got home from church they found me still trying to saw through some 2x4's with a hand saw. When they figured out what I was doing my Dad sent me in the house to help my Mom with the Sunday dinner. The rest of the afternoon he spent building me a horse. When I got home from school Monday I found my Mom had made a red corduroy saddle for the horse. They set it up in the woods beside our house and I would run out to ride it every night after school. The next year I got riding lessons on the real thing...and my only piece of horse equipment was a leather crop. I would rub it on the school horse after every lesson and then at night I would sleep with the crop and inhale the delicious scent of horsey sweat. Where does such a passion stem from? I have no idea but it has lasted a lifetime. And I am forever indebted to my non-horsey parents for supporting that passion from day one.Comment
-
You know you've married a horsewoman when:
Your peace offering after an argument is something from a tack shop, NOT a dozen roses.
Even though you are not a horse person yourself, you wake up one morning and discover that, not only do you know how to SPELL Trakehner, you can also explain to another non-horse person (NHP) key points of their history and breeding.
More here: http://www.dressageart.com/horsesayings2.htmComment
-
I read every book even mentioning the word horse in my home library then my school and then moved on to the public library.
Even though we had a horse my sister was NOT good at sharing and she was the oldest. So I would collect change and pop bottles for the $3 - $4.50/hr it cost to go to the livery - where the allowed me to ride w/o the guides!!!"If you don't know where you are going, any road will take you there"Comment
-
A-ha! Like the OP I "cantered" around my yard with hands in correct position. I also managed to climb aboard our mailbox and "rode" that until my weight almost brought it down!
Did any of you make your parents stop the car when you passed a horse in a pasture? I just *had* to feed it blades of grasss over the fence. I was then given riding lessons which I thank my parents for braving the danger. I drew horses constantly and knew someday I'd be an artist. Turned out an "artist who paints horses".
Had to wait until I was 25 to get my first horse, a dream come true.
When I got my second horse last year (at 40+), I started subscribing to every horsie magazine out there to help me brush up on my skills. I noticed a new obcession starting....my poor NH friends are bored stiff as I have become a horse crazy old lady!Comment
-
My dad likes to tell this story...its when he knew he was in trouble. I was about 4 or 5 years old and a neighbor down the street had a horse. She used to ride up and down the street (this was in the early '70's) and one day offered to let me sit on the horse. Somehow I ended up slipping off the horse and fell. Of course I was crying and my Dad thought, well that's it...end of the horse obsession. He was trying to comfort me and said he was sorry the "bad horsie" hurt me and I responded, "No, I want to get back on!"Comment
-
You knew you were horse crazy when....
Playing tag after dark on horses while bareback in a pasture that doubled as the Cross Country Course. Riding and swimming(while in a bathing suit). "Cantering" in Gym class(minus a horse), sadly I may have been in 10th grade then.
KStrange how much you've got to know Before you know how little you know. AnonymousComment
-
Made my golden retriever my children's hunter. She could jump 3 foot, and did amazing rollbacks and lead changes
I would make her hang out in the plastic play house with a dutch door and eat and drink out of buckets. She was such a good dog! She still loved me and slept with me every night.
I also had an entire Equestrian Center set up in my bedroom with bryer horses. They didn't have any of the cool accessories when I was a kid, so I made everything. I made fences, stalls, hay bales. I even went as far as to take old socks and make polo wraps, standing wraps, saddle pads, blankets, and quarter sheets. I should have gotten into the market...they were really very impressive!
I also, of course, had a bike that was a racehorse. I held on to a jump rope tied on the handle bars and wore my riding helmet and would ride around this circle on our street, racing my brother, and we'd take turns announcing...Strong promoter of READING the entire post before responding.Comment
-
My mother would drop my father down by the beach to run, when I was about seven. By it, was a big thoroughbred farm. I'd always bring carrots to feed to the horses in the pasture. They were so beautiful. I nagged my parents, tirelessly, for a year, to get my own horse. I was lucky my father rode when he was a boy, so it wasn't that much of a hard sell.Comment
-
I knew I was horse crazy, or should I say my mother knew I was . . .when I took the key from her antique secretary desk and carved pictures of 'ponies' in the front of it at the age of 4. To this day the artwork still remains there.
I got my point across!!! I got a spankin' but I got my point across!!!Lions and Tigers and Bears, oh my!!Comment
-
The first horse I ever met was SUBKs eventing gelding and I was like, 2. It was only downhill from there.
Before I was old enough to take lessons, my best friend from next door would come over after HER lessons (she was 3 years older than me) and teach me what she had learned on 'Clippity-clop' who was one of those horses attached to springs, like this (except older and probably less safe): http://i.walmartimages.com/i/p/00/65...46_215X215.jpg
The result of these lessons was that I knew how to post before I had ever actually trotted a real horse!
I used to make courses out of logs and sticks in my back yard; then I'd walk it; then I'd jump it.
I used to gallop EVERYWHERE. To the point where my basketball coaches had to reteach me how to run like a person.
I begged for a horse for every holiday and birthday. My parents always told me I would grow out of it; then they told me that I could get a horse when I could pay for it; then they told me it had to wait until I wasn't living in their house. So the summer between freshman and sophomore year of college I rescued a neglected OTTB that had been sitting in a field for 5 years doing nothing, and brought him to school... Regardless of whether that was a smart or stupid decision, he is MINE. And being able to say "yep, that pretty chestnut is MY horse" is worth it all!"My shopping list is getting long but I will add the marshmallows right below the napalm." -WeighatonComment
Comment