The Summer Train

Tonight, I paced myself through a full set of chores. After scrubbing several feed buckets, I carried water up to Dar and Scout in their grass paddock. I don't think I expected (or even thought about, for that matter) that my two horses would like each other, but they do. They have their own agendas, I think, Dar to be boss, Scout to glom on to someone, but they've arrived at a contentment with each other. Together, they trotted up from the far corner to watch me pour the water into their trough, then crowded up to the fence for scratches.

I'm happy to see them side by side, not one here and the other there. Because he's in training, Dar has been uppermost in my mind, while Scout settled into the background.

I picked out the paddocks, dropped flakes of hay in the stalls, and brought the horses in for what is predicted to be a stormy night. Everybody was quiet after food time, ready to doze. Scout whickered at me as I swept the aisle. It was a summons that I recognized. I carried my grooming supplies into her stall. Forty-five minutes passed while I skidded the shedding block over her, sweeping after with a soft body brush. She rested her head heavily on my shoulder when I curried the spot where her neck meets her chest, scabbed over now from the brief storm of black gnats that visited the farm last week. I picked her feet and trimmed her bridle path before smoothing her all over with a bar towel. It was a deep, thorough grooming, the kind that long ago became a language for me and Scout. She was soft eyed and still. I stood with my arms around her neck and inhaled the smell of her. In the distance, I heard the long whistle of a freight train, a summer sound I love like the ocean, so deeply does it resonate with me.

All this reminded me of how it was with me and Scout. I could feel her knowing me, sense her sleepy devotion. I think I saw, in recognizing that, that I have changed, gone on from who I was when I perceived Scout almost always through a scrim of fear. I'd like to believe I've grown. If I have, then getting back on Scout could be different. That's the next step for us. I just have to know if I can ride her.

The Sucker Punch

H.G. and I went to Los Angeles for the weekend, so I was away from the horses for five days, the longest absence I've had from them in months. K and her husband took these pictures of Dar while I was gone. On Tuesday night, I went to the barn to do the PM feed, knowing I would see Scout and Dar, but I was draggy from the trip. Wednesday, I went back out. It was a surprisingly beautiful day. I could have ridden Gambler, but I wanted to get my hands on horse bodies. I shedded Gambler instead, and then went out to get Dar.

His paddock borders one of the large pastures. I turned him loose, expecting him to tear around and be breathtaking, but instead he chose to follow me like a dog. I ran out ahead of him, but he only kept pace, stopping when I did. I walked him to the cross ties out under the eave of the barn. He settled in, tipping a lazy heel in the afternoon sun. After brushing out his mane and tail, I started shedding him. Dead grey hairs sifted down over the white carpet left by Gambler.

Dar isn't tall, but he is big. Shedding him is hard work. I have to do a section, clean the shedding block and brush,and then do another. I saw him in bits and angles, a haunch here, a shoulder there. His headset has changed so much since I got him, come from a drooping, heavy palm frond to something much more upright. It was 6:30 when I stopped and stepped back to look at my work. Instead, I looked at Dar. He stared back at me, and just then, I was slayed. In an instant, he got me, the rest of me, the one bit still holding back, clinging to rationality. Something about him, about his body, about his face. I love him. I love him.

Six Long Months

Beautiful weather. I left work early to see the horses.

One thing has changed irrevocably in me since Scout's injury: my priorities. I won't allow less important things, less meaningful things, to push the horses into the background anymore. Keeping even one of them will require sacrifice and commitment, things I now realize I'm perfectly willing to accept. To work that hard for them means they deserve more of my time than the things that come easily.

When I pulled up to the barn today, Scout was lying down, her legs curled under her, catlike, in the sun and mud. She was basking, her eyes alert, her expression soft, completely relaxed. It's only the second time in the years I've owned her that I've seen her lying down.

The last time I was on a horse was in September 2009. I can't even believe that. But K told me I could ride Gambler whenever I wanted to. It means a lot to be trusted with another person's horse.

Gambler dozed in the cross ties while I spent 45 minutes peeling off some of his winter coat with a shedding block and brush. Eventually, a deep white pelt covered the ground around us. I love grooming horses, especially in springtime.

I tacked up Gambler and off we went. It was just a 30-minute ride, but I was also shedding. I left bits of frustration, pressure, tension and sadness behind me with every step. Gambler picked his way through the wet edge of the field. The sunlight, the stillness. Somewhere, a woodpecker jack-hammered a tree.

At the center of the south pasture, we rode serpentines and circles. I kept a light, steady contact, and deepened my seat, stretching tall.

Oh, I can remember how to ride.

Yuck

Don't you hate it when something as mundane and useless as the stomach flu keeps you from seeing your horses?

My alpha mare doesn't mind. She's still settling in at the pony club barn. Naturally, she picked a fight with her new paddock buddy 10 days ago and caught a kick on the left hock. Same old same old. But I am looking forward to getting back on her. It's been more than a month since I've ridden. When you love to ride, your body almost tells you when it's been too long. There's a kind of shadowy ache, like the horse is a phantom limb.

I was telling a friend last night how traveling back and forth between these two horses seems to lend me confidence with both. I forget the familiarity I have with her, but it comes back to me when I'm handling him. His youth casts her maturity in a calming light. She and I have our habits.

I take both of them out of their stalls, clip them in cross ties, and groom, talking, talking the whole time. Scout loves that drill, settles into it and sighs. Dar, on the other hand, is still a little unfamiliar with such direct attention. The first weeks, he kept his head high. Little by little, though, look. The draw bridge is lowering. It's true, you can begin to win a horse through simple touch.