Working through Horse Challenges (and others) Pays Off

It’s been a challenging few days. Have you ever been through a period where even the simplest things turn complicated? It’s felt like that lately. I mean, I just wanted to wash my car yesterday and every one I went to was closed. No wonder I don’t like going to Austin anymore. And the dentist said I need two crowns. All that flossing didn’t prevent that.

But I got to see my former coworker for lunch, and that was positive.

Plus, I got through row 4 of my temperature blanket yesterday. The black and green square is where February starts. That was the ice storm, too.

The horses have been challenging, other than being so good getting their feet done. I was really looking forward to getting a lesson today, at long last. They were, at least, good getting ready to go, but that challenging life thing struck again and we couldn’t get into the road to Tarrin’s because a huge, stopped train blocked us. Sigh. But we went the other way!

For Apache’s lesson, Tarrin tried to get him frustrated, so we did new stuff. To our surprise, he was all calm and learned to trot over small jumps. On the last one I did everything right and he JUMPED! And it was FUN! Hooray! Our hard work paid off!

We then proceeded to see if he’d leg yield at a trot. Did he get annoyed? No. He DID IT. It wasn’t perfect, but he did it! I wish I could say he never showed his Old Patchy behavior, because he did fall apart as we went to the trailer. I handled it, though, keeping as calm as I could. I’ve learned a lot!

Drew, on the other hand, didn’t need a lot of prompting to misbehave. Or be a teen. He and I did ok doing some serpentine moves, but he decided I was easy to manipulate and melted down. I “got to” work through it and did a lot of leg yielding with him. No fun but we got through it with a lot of help from Tarrin and ended up able to weave through poles and go over obstacles. I was proud that I stayed calm.

When I was done, Tarrin ride him and he continued to indicate his displeasure. I learn a lot when I watch her handle rowdy horses. And Droodles did look pretty acting pissy.

Drew kept neighing his head off, which is quite unlike him. Tarrin said she’d never seen him act that way, either. Her theory is that it’s the extra sweet spring grass. It’s not making either horse lame, but they’re not quite themselves. Other horses are acting similarly right now, which made me feel better. It’s not ALL a lack of skill on my part!

Diagnosis: magnesium. I got some to feed tonight, and I’ll order more tomorrow. Let’s hope that helps. I don’t want summer too soon!