Sunday, October 3, 2010

MY horse

Today is the day I can officially call Amber "my horse." Whether you believe in fate, destiny, or God (as I do) we were brought together to be together from this day on and hopefully to celebrate many October 3rd anniversaries.

Surreal? Yes. Since I was a kid, I always felt like I was on the outside looking in. Wanting to take lessons, wanting my own horse. I went to rodeos and horse shows and read every horse book and magazine I could get my hands on, but all of that only intensified the desire. Summer horse camps were a tonic, but they couldn't cure the disease.

It has been 16 years since I read Misty of Chincoteague, the one that started it all. Thank you, Marguerite Henry, for penning such a masterpiece of children's literature. How many other little girls have read that book and wanted their own pony? Now I have the opportunity to live that dream. I thought it would take longer. When I joined the Natural Connection on September 19th of last year, I wanted to get back in to riding. I wasn't on the market for a horse, but little did I know that one month later there would be a horse on the market for me...

...and I fell in love with a skinny red mare, with a dirty white blaze. She was just beginning to grow her poor excuse of a winter coat and I had just come to Miran Farm a few weeks prior. But even through her dull coat and malnourished body the elegance and refinement bred into the thoroughbred still radiated. She needed longer than most to settle in to her new home so it wasn't until March that I began to ride her. She was a very simple horse to ride. Simple as in she only knew how to do one thing - go fast!

My experiences learning from Amber that I have chronicled in this blog have mostly been positive. If I ever get frustrated, I try to keep it to myself for the benefit of my readers and to not discourage others who would like to take on the challenge (and it is a challenge) of retraining an OTTB. There are a few entries where the frustration seeped out into the keyboard, but I have been taught to look for a positive takeaway from every experience.

And so the journey continues except now I am no longer the little girl on the outside looking in. I am the young woman flying through the fields, drinking the wind, crouched over the withers of...my horse!