lessons in riding: a tribute to a friend

Our good friend and massage therapist said goodbye to a grand old mare yesterday. Go well, Polly!!  Your herd will miss you but we know you're running fast and free.

writing retreat week

I've been at one of my favorite and most productive places on the planet since last Monday. I'm happy to say that I've completed the first draft of my second middle grade novel, Fiona and the Water Horse, which is book two in my Magical Pony School series. Now it gets to sit for a couple of weeks at which point I'll return to it, weave any loose threads in, add anything I forgot or that comes to me between now and then, and after that I'll send it to three Good Readers, who will give me some feedback. Cover design, a final edit, and it will be published just in time for the spring equinox, which is when this book takes place. Meanwhile, everyone at November Hill has struggled on without me. Although they all sound quite fine when I check in by telephone! I'm sure there's a way to add images from my iPad but at the moment I can't figure it out. I've been adding them to Facebook all week, so come visit me there if you want to see some of the photos. Our writers' rooms have all been spruced up since we were here last, and we've had some ghost activity. Par for the course here at the Magic Mansion. Tomorrow I'll be heading home, with a stop by two feed stores for a couple of things we need. Can't wait to see the entire November Hill crew, human and animal alike. I suspect tomorrow night will find me watching however many Downton Abbey episodes there are by now in season 2, surrounded by cats, Corgis, equines (outside my window) and the human family. That's when I'll know I'm home again. And.. almost forgot! I will be publishing a "Billie Hinton short" just in time for Valentine's Day this year - a fun and whimsical celebration of love and celosia called PASSION FLOWERS AND ITALIANS. It will be free on Valentine's Day on Amazon.

apropos of nothing, really, a reposting of my appeal for humane and connected horsemanship

an appeal for humane and connected horsemanship

Seventeen years ago I was given a book by William Sears, M.D., called The Baby Book, in which Dr. Sears talked about his theory of parenting, referred to as attachment parenting.

Dr. Sears' theory of attachment parenting (often called AP), calls for developing a secure bond with our children, the goal being a secure, connected child who grows into an empathetic, connected adult.

Attachment Parenting International offers the following guiding principles, which facilitate strong, nurturing connections between children and their parents:

1. preparing for pregnancy, birth, and parenting
2. feeding with love and respect
3. responding with sensitivity
4. using nurturing touch
5. ensuring safe sleep, physically and emotionally
6. providing consistent and loving care
7. practicing positive discipline
8. striving for balance in personal and family life

With only a few tweaks of language, all of the above could easily be set forth as guiding principles for living humanely and in connection with horses (and donkeys, and all equines).

Last week it was Pat Parelli and Catwalk.

This week I have read an article about a miniature donkey strapped into a harness against her will and parasailed up and down a beach in the name of "publicity." The donkey was terrified, landed quite roughly, and apparently was in such distress while in the air, left many children crying in upset confusion. And yet, after a public outcry when the owner was finally located and the donkey examined by a veterinarian, there will apparently be no charges of abuse or cruelty because the donkey sustained no physical injuries.

In the smaller circle of equine community, I have read a post on a forum about the need to keep working our horses, despite the heat, because of the need to maintain a training schedule. Heat indexes where I live have ranged from 112-119 degrees for the past week. It's easy enough to see that extreme heat affects horses more quickly and more seriously than it does the average, healthy human. They have hair covering their entire bodies. Their digestive tracts rely on regular intake of forage and water to remain functional. When we ride them, they are not only working, but carrying our weight.

I received an email informing me of things to do to haul horses safely in heat, in advance of Pony Club National Championships coming up next weekend in Virginia. Nationals are held in Kentucky and Virginia on alternate years, always in late July/early August. Why schedule something that involves hauling horses and ponies from all over the US during the hottest time of year?

I read a Facebook entry referring to a pony as a "butthead" because he didn't want to go into the ring for a show class, tried to leave, and bucked. Has the pony been checked for physical pain? Bit fit, saddle fit, muscle soreness, feet checked, chiropractic issues? The pony's behavior is indicative of something being wrong, either physically or emotionally. How else can he express it? My guess is that if he didn't want to go into the ring to jump, and that was paid attention to, he wouldn't have then needed to buck to get his point across. And yet no one listened. He was a "butthead."

Is there no end to the narcissism, self-centeredness, and downright ignorance of human beings? I can't think of any reason save an emergency trip to the vet school that would call for loading any horse or donkey into a trailer at this time of year, in this heat, with the expectation that the horse/donkey stand in a strange stall, hot, stressed, and yet ready and willing to perform strenuous work in a competitive setting.

I can't imagine having hauled any of my horses to any event this week and being remotely capable of disparaging them because they resisted being ridden.

And I could no more strap Rafer Johnson or Redford in a harness and drag them through the air for the sake of making a little money than I could one of my human children.

What in the world are we thinking when we expect animals to serve as vehicles for our bank accounts, our egos, and our apparently desperate need for external validation?

Alice Miller wrote a number of books about parents who expect these things of their children. She describes in great psychological detail what this does to children, and how the effects ripple into adulthood.  It's time someone wrote a similar treatise on people and their horses. There is no ribbon on earth, no amount of money, and no genuine self-gratification worth the cost of treating animals like objects, with no feelings, no rights, and little effort on our parts toward creating, nurturing, and maintaining a deeper relationship.

When we ignore the deeper, unspoken needs of the equines we ride and use for our own purposes, there is a cost. Not dollars and cents, although certainly we may end up with broken down horses and big vet bills at some point down the road. The cost I refer to is a psychic, soul-deep cost that I'm not sure we even know the consequences of incurring. It's a cost to humanity and to growth as human beings.

 I know this sounds serious. I believe it to be true.

I'm not opposed to competitive horse sport, but the reward of competition should be based in the maturing of the rider's increasingly connected relationship with the horse, and in the making of sound, safe decisions based on the needs of the horse, who can't leave a voicemail saying "oh, by the way, I really don't feel like carrying you over jumps in 90+ degree heat - how about we do it another time?"

As much as our children rely on us to intuit and meet their needs when they're too young to do it for themselves, our horses and our donkeys (and our cats and dogs and birds and all the other wonderful animals we surround ourselves with) need us to be their biggest, most thoughtful advocates and partners.

And I can say with certainty borne of experience, when we say NO to "smack him harder," when we say NO to "that noseband needs to be TIGHT," when we say IT'S TOO HOT TO HAUL, WE WON'T BE THERE when we get the email asking about the upcoming horse show, and when we say "I'll do what it takes to find out why you bucked in that last class" - what we get in return is something far more valuable than a training schedule checked off, a thumbs up from an unenlightened trainer, a few new clients for our company, or a fistful of cheap show ribbons.

We get connection. We get devotion. We get to participate in the magical relationship that is the amazing and most genuine gift horses and donkeys offer humans.

And more than that, I think we elevate ourselves as humans. We raise the bar for our own species. Instead of expecting more of them, how about we expect more of ourselves?

watch for some changes on camera-obscura

As part of my 2012 leap forward thinking (it occurred to me as I typed that my birthday - my real, leap day birthday - is happening this year and maybe that has prompted me into forward motion!) I am going to be playing around with the idea of simplifying my life.

In a lot of ways, but specifically, by pulling together all my online sites into one place. I'm not quite sure how I am going to do this yet, but I *think* the end result will be a "splash" page with a fun photo and links to all my social media sites and a link to ONE blog. Which will incorporate all my writing stuff, riding and horse stuff, professional stuff, and farm stuff.

While it's easier to have them separate at times, they are all inexplicably connected, and it has always felt slightly artificial to me to divide my life up into these categories.

I think if I organize it well, the simplicity of one place to write what I want to write will be easier and better.

Somehow I will link all the domain names together - not sure how but I think it can be done. And hope to see everyone who comes to the different sites all coming to one place to visit, read, comment, and keep me company in cyber-space.

trim notes 2012

Yesterday we had a visit from our new trimmer. She came over in December to take a look at Rafer Johnson's front hooves, which were having some issues and had gotten sore. Turned out he had white line disease which started at the toes and went up quite high into the hoof walls.

She did a corrective trim to expose the tissue to air, lowered his heels so he was comfortable again, and gave us instructions on keeping those two little hoof works of art (one was cut out in a lovely c-curve, and the other was a nice v-shape) clean so they could begin to grow tight, healthy wall.

We watched Rafer go from ouchy to tentative in about an hour's time. Since then he is back to galloping the fields with his buddy Redford.

And because I wanted this trimmer to follow up with Rafer Johnson, we made the decision to go with her for all the equines. Based on yesterday's trims, I think we are going to be very happy with her work.

Everyone got terrific trims, but Keil Bay's and Salina's were the most notable.

Keil's front heels have never been taken down quite far enough, in my very humble still-learning-every-day-about-hoof-trimming opinion. He has contracted heels. Not severely so, and much better than when he wore shoes, but I still struggle with frog development in his fronts. She took them down, and when she put the first front hoof down and he stood on it, he began to lick and chew. He licked and chewed his way through the entire trim!

He walked off with an even more exaggerated panther walk than usual - his big, reaching, gorgeous walk.

Salina has not had a proper trim in over a year. She has a tough time picking up her front hooves and although she can extend them forward, our previous trimmer (and I, to be sure) had gotten into a kind of rut of not even asking her to pick them up, in an effort to make things easier for her. Yesterday she picked up her hinds perfectly (which she usually does) but also was fully capable of putting them forward onto the hoof stand so they got a much more thorough trim than they have been getting.

With the fronts, she was fully capable, with some rest periods, to put both hooves forward onto the stand which allowed the trim to be done in a much more "normal" way - and for the first time in a long time, she got the full, complete trim done. She too walked off with some vigor.

It was a hard decision for all of us when we made this change. The professionals who work with our horses become like extended family in a way. The level of trust I need to have to place my horses and donkeys in the hands of someone is huge. But sometimes we go as far as we can with one person and then it's time to move on. It was hard to say goodbye, but we're happy to be starting a new chapter in hoof care with a gifted new trimmer.

Like every other issue that happens with horses and their health and well-being, I learned a huge amount as we went through the process of sorting out Rafer's front feet. As hard as it is to live through these things, every single time I do it I end up feeling like it was a lesson that needed to happen. Rafer Johnson taught me again how important it is to listen to the horse and to the donkey. Watch and stop and listen. If I had paid closer attention to him when he began to get fussy about having his hooves picked out, we would have discovered the problem much, much sooner. But seeing his hoof wall be cut away taught me something about the structure of the hoof that I suspect I might never have learned from a book or a picture.

And seeing him go from lame to sound, from fussy and upset to calm and appreciative, is just one more example of what these equines have to teach us.