Well, December is here… finally. I’m pretty much over 2018 at this point and ready for it to be over. What a festive spirit for the holidays, right? 

In all seriousness, my riding has been blah for a smorgasbord of reasons. Cold doesn’t motivate me to do much except hibernate in my slippers, my saddle needed adjusting, I didn’t have it in me to put the work in to do much more than just bareback walks. So, we did those. And then gradually I started actually tacking up my horse again. Rode in the dressage saddle (because really ‘my saddle needs adjusting’ is not an excuse when you have 2). Finally took a lesson. Took that momentum and had some really good rides.

Saddle just needed to be picked up in the back, which made a world of difference for feeling like I was actually on top of my horse vs on an entirely different plane. That balance back gave me some of my bravery to actually, uh, make Doc go do something. Like, not trot like a llama maybe. 

This fall, but the beginning of all my rides was a fight. Moving into the indoor for winter didn’t exactly improve things. Smaller arena + lower ceiling = lizard brain thinks I’m going to DIE everytime my horse hops in the air.. Cool. Finally, last week I pulled out our BOT quarter sheet and happened to get to the barn early for my lesson and spent a good 20-30 minutes walking to warm up, not asking for much/anything. And then when I asked him to go forward… I got some angry ears, but no fight. No fit. No tantrum. Huh. And then we had a great lesson.

So I repeated the experiment again during the week. And… magic. It worked there too. What a thought – my horse needs a longer walk to warm up before going forward? In the cold? Groundbreaking.

So naturally, as soon as I have this breakthrough and have some great rides, I get bronchitis. Because, 2018.

I’ve spent the last 5 days in bed, trying to entertain a Jack Russell while not dying. Today I rejoined the living just in time to… pack and get on an airplane. I sincerely apologize to anyone near me this week, I promise not to breathe on you. 

At this point, I’ve thrown in the towel on 2018. Here’s to a better 2019!

There are two Docs: five-minute Doc and two hour Doc. They follow the 80/20 rule – so 80% of the time, I have five minute Doc who comes out ready to play ball and happily carts my butt around. But 20% of the time… I get two hour Doc. Doc who does not remember he is 17. Who thinks I am his minion and my input is unnecessary. Getting two hour Doc at home just means we work – a lot.

Last weekend weekend, though, we had the perfect storm of circumstances that meant I got 2 hour Doc… going XC schooling.

It started when he pulled his shoe last Saturday and didn’t get it back on until Thursday afternoon. Nothing like a little five day vacay. Then, he got turned out Friday night without his grazing muzzle – and promptly gorged himself on grass all night long.

Add in some muggy swampy weather in there, a very spooky *empty* field next to the XC course…

I spent the 2/3rd of my morning (sortof) reinstalling brakes. Including the one time we bolted clear across the entire back half of the course in some sort of Saddlebred American Pharoah impression that was independently decided upon without any input from the bipeds. I stayed on my the grace of Animo sticky breeches, God going, “well I guess one broken back is enough for a year,” and the willpower to know if I landed on the ground I was probably just going to send everyone on their way and lay there until I shrived up in the heat and died.

I had these grand plans after jump judging last weekend – we were going to school all the fun BN jumps! Maybe some smaller N stuff! Whee!

HAHAHAHA. We made it over approximately 4 starter jumps. The actual jumping? No problem. The landing and immediately deciding to go full tilt Training 450mpm? Not really on my to-do list. I have discovered muscles I did not know existed from the level of sore I am.

My water bottle was gone by the first hour and at one point I actually had to get off and stand in the shade, take off my vest and helmet and attempt not to throw up from being so hot. It was warm and muggy, but more, he’d managed to suck every bit of strength and energy out of me by then. I finally got to a point where I was confident I wouldn’t pass out off the side of my horse, got back on and we headed to the back side of the course (okay, front actually here, we went backwards). Where my saintly horse returned and was more than happy to go happily jump over anything and everything,

Where were you an hour and a half ago?! By this time I was essentially out of steam and Doc was straight up drenched in foamy sweat, so even though we now had the hamsters back on the wheel to go do fun things, neither of us had much left to give.

We had a blast jumping around and through the water, did a baby bank into the water, jumped an inviting little BN jump finally and called it a day on that note. The second half felt successful, but the first half of the day was… not fun. At all.

Good for the stories, but I don’t need to experience 2 hour Doc for like… ever again.

Pro: My horse is athletic enough to leave from like, the next county over and jump clean.

Con: I am not athletic enough to stay on when this happens.

Pro: Head didn’t hit the ground! Nothing broken!

Con: Back muscles are very, very angry with me.

Pro: Horse stopped and did not step on me.

Con: Ended up on ground, not on top of horse.

Pro: I can’t get a pair of pants on. Which means I don’t have to wear pants.

Con: I still  have to get dressed and go to work.

Pro: Ibuprofen and Acetaminophen are great!

Con: Might not have kidneys by the time this is over*

Pro: Got to catch up on a ton of TV this weekend

Con: Might not have any brain cells left

Pro: Got my money back on my show entry for next weekend

Con: Not showing next weekend

Pro: Only ruined my shirt, not the Animo breeches I had on

Con: Pretty sure my shirt was an omen for Carolina basketball

Pro: Not on video as evidence like uh, all of my other falls

Con: You don’t get to watch me lawn dart through the air.

Happy March Madness y’all!

*  Don’t worry I’m carefully monitoring my dosages!

We actually got to have a lesson outside last weekend! And jump! Miracles, I tell you.

Of course, it’s snowing again now. Staahhhhpppp Indy-anna.

Saddle adjustment seems to have fixed our go button issues, thank goodness, and  the weekend before we had a great dressage lesson. Wherein I got to ride my first half-pass (at a walk, but STILL). Of course, I also leaned so far over in my canter circle I almost fell off, but hey, I never claimed to be good at this stuff.

The fun thing is that my dressage lesson translated over into my jumping lesson really well (like, imagine that?!). A better canter making things easier? Who would have thought…

This lesson marked the first time we’ve really jumped since we got kicked into the indoor, so I was pleasantly surprised to find that 2’6″ didn’t feel big at all. My steering is undoubtedly rusty (um, we took out an entire crossrail and my foot nearly took out a standard), but the actual jumping felt great. (Minus one bad-ASS inside turn I pulled off like NBD) I still need to work on not leaning at my jumps, because what do you mean, lean at jump and land in a heap isn’t a reliable strategy? Idk.

My eye got better throughout the lesson, but will just need more repetitions (gonna be playing a lot of the ‘counting’ game) all spring. And you know, remembering that my horse has a lead change and on the occasion he isn’t automatic, like… asking for it? Not ‘panic, panic, where do I do, what is happening, why is the sky blue’. You know, what happened immediately after the video above stops.

The part not shown on video (not because I don’t want to, but because all the technology rebelled) is when we turn left after that jump, come around the end of the arena to jump two flower boxes + barrels set without standards. And miss them. Because riding all the way through the corner and keeping your inside leg on is too difficult for me to comprehend or something. While Doc may be a saintly creature who carts my butt around, it was a good reminder that I still have to sit up, ride and steer. That when jumps look like uh, not jumps, he still needs me to do my job and set him up right. Straightness, corners, not-leaning-around-turns-like-I-am-a-racecar.

Our dressage lesson also pointed out my extreme weakness when it comes to my inside rein. I just cannot let go of it. Trainer C actually had me pushing my arm/hand forward to an extreme – like 6″ forward for 2-3 strides at a time just to get a feel for it. My brain just can’t comprehend how I can be on a circle/have contact/have even reins/insert something here and not be on my inside rein. UGH. I keep practicing physically pushing that hand forward, trying to overcome my muscle memory, but it’s like my brain overtakes and yells at me “NO DON’T DO THAT.” Seriously, I’m at my wits end with myself over this issue – if anyone has ideas on this, please toss them out. It’s 100% a mental block at this point. I need to work on it though, because it’s only going to be a bigger issue as we progress. Halp.

Riding is hard, guys.

I have been avoiding taking a dreaded bareback lesson for basically weeks now. It’s not like I didn’t ride Lucy bareback all the time, I think it was mostly I knew it would be hard and I didn’t want to work hard. Should probably find a new hobby if that’s the case…

Last Wednesday night was cold though. (If you would like to comment in any other way than commiserating with me, DON’T. I was cold. STOP MAKING FUN OF ME.) It was only 45 when I got to the barn, the sun was going down and when C said, “bareback lesson?” I basically just didn’t have the fight in me (it was frozen). I also figured that was fewer straps for non-glove hands to do, closer to body heat and riding in the indoor meant soft footing if I decided to just bail and fall off.

Turns out, I… enjoyed it?

Yeah.

I mean it was hard, don’t get me wrong. My butt is sore two days later, my hips are like, “hey girl can you go back to yoga plzzzz?!” and my abs are having fun reminding me there are muscles there even if I pretend to ignore them and cover them in ice cream 87.5% of the time.

But it was also fun. We worked on using my breath and hips to change the pace of the horse – something that if you had told me before my lesson I could do, I would have said, “sure” and rolled my eyes. BUT I DID IT.

(From here, this is record for my own knowledge base so beware stream of consciousness and boring.)

Essentially we worked on the swing of my hips at the walk following in the figure 8 motion of the horse’s steps. Keeping my arms at a 90 degree angle, so I’m maintaining my own arms, not letting them be dead weight, and pulling my bellybutton to my spine without dropping my collarbone. Letting my ears drop away from my shoulders (story. of. my. life. it’s a miracle I still have a neck), and using my core to balance and follow. NOT clamping my leg down or letting it creep up and get shorter.

To increase, we added energy to breath, maintaining the same pace and rhythm (four count in through nose, four count out through mouth), making it louder and actually using it to lengthen my spine, making me lighter in the seat. It sounds ridiculous, but makes a lot of sense in context of yoga classes I’ve taken. Breath + hips added pace, all the way through to some really nice upwards trot transitions.

Downward, we quieted the breath. Still the same four/four, but this time being quieter and adding weight to my seat, sitting down. At one point, I got really nice trot-walk-halt transitions through nothing more than seat/breath. Not a single touch on my reins or a ‘whoa’ or anything. Crazy.

Sitting the trot was definitely the challenge of the lesson. It was really hard for me to sit. I would immediately go to clamp down with my legs, which made them shorter, made me actually bounce more and pissed off my horse. Go figure. By relaxing my leg (counterintuitive!) and tilting the front of my pelvis up, Doc actually (kindof) raised his back, got round, and I was able to sit it. At one point we even got a, “You look like a real dressage rider!”

Basically the best comment EVER.

I’m super sore, but have a total new appreciation for riding bareback as more than just toodling along on my horse. I have a feeling there’s going to be a lot more bareback rides in my future this winter.

Last weekend would end up being the last of our super nice, gorgeous fall weather lessons apparently since I promptly had to turn my heat on on Monday.My usual Saturday lesson was moved to Sunday morning, so after a ridiculously easy hack on Saturday afternoon it was apparent that Doc had been planning on having a lazy-watch-Netflix-couch-potato weekend and I was very rudely interrupting this. Nothing like having non-horse friends in town watch you look like an idiot who can’t get your horse to do… anything. Like trot. Even going out on the track and letting Doc go full out (aka where he usually runs away with me at least once because OMGSOFASTSADDLEBRED) didn’t do it.

Sunday’s lesson ended up being grids, probably further cementing thoughts of, “seriously she spends how much time riding and still looks like that?”

Above video is case in point, where I came around the corner to see everything has been moved up and went WHAT THE HELL THOSE LOOK BIG and Doc said, um I don’t think she wants to do this guys.

We haven’t done grids together before, so this was a new experience for me. Doc, per his usual self, took care of me through them. And yes, I still managed to drift left. Like, here’s an exercise where you literally don’t have to steer Holly and I still manage it. At this point it’s going to be on my headstone: Here lies Holly. Drifted left over an oxer. RIP.

All being said and done, it felt (pretty) good. It’s so comforting to have a horse who I know will get me through (even when I underpower him oops I’M SORRY I FELT LIKE I WAS GOING FAST).

Please ignore the point where I just fall over on my saintly horse’s neck

With that, entries for the last show of the season went in today. CT at 2’3″ starter and gulp… CT at BN. My reasoning being that it’s a schooling show and if I get in there and want to trot everything or just not everything, then I can do that.

Well, Trainer C miiiiight kill me, but I also get to do two dressage tests and GOD KNOWS I need help on those. I’d just like a score less than a mid-life crisis here. I guess we’ll either end the season really high or really low. Aim for the moon, land in the stars basically = aim for BN, chicken out and jump 2’3″ right???

Last Thursday my mom happened to be in town for my lesson, which would be my last jumping lesson before our CT last weekend. An 8am lesson unfortunately meant a 5:45am wakeup, but she was a good sport and I bribed her with Starbucks and we were off. Of course, despite all the days surrounding being gorgeous, it was misty and grey out. I’m basically the nicest daughter ever.

Quick warmup, Doc felt really good, and other than being told to get my leg forward like 4543 times per usual, everything went pretty swimmingly.

Our course was still up from the week before, so we had real jumps to go jump too! First couple warm up jumps went well and then she made up a course for me to go jump.

Fun fact: I’m terrible at remembering things told to me. If I can see it on paper, I’m good. Just hearing it? In one ear, right out the other. You can imagine how fun this makes having courses told to me during lessons. It usually involves my reciting it back about 7 times and still getting lost the first time.

This rang very true on Thursday. I got lost on my rollback (..twice?), got lost from the oxer to the yellow (um, every time?) and generally just needed additional caffeine apparently.

I also had an inability to jump the oxer straight. Left drifts are my thing I guess?

The best part of this lesson was directly influenced by said inabilities to jump straight and remember where you’re going:

Yeah, genius over here jumped crooked, got lost, couldn’t decide which way to go, decided the answer was “put all your weight in your outside stirrup and lean” and add a loose girth… No Hollys or Docs were injured in the making of this film.

We eventually got it (sortof mostly) together, but it definitely lit up some issues that carried forward into this weekend and that are on our winter to-do list. Like… jumping straight? Weird.