Look I know I have declared my undying love for Flaire and
she is a wonderful schoolmistress and she is truly gorgeous. (You can sense a
but here can’t you,
And here it comes BUT,I rode Oscar last week and now I am
smitten. I am such a floozy! (He's the one on the right of the photo being ridden by Meg a couple of weeks ago)
I went up last Monday because we couldn’t ride on our usual Wednesday
and Flaire was not available for me, Hayley told me I could have a go on Oscar.
“You will find him a bit different,” she told me. The nerves started to creep in.
I wanted to appear
chilled, “oh tell me more?” Well go very soft on his mouth and start gentle on
the leg ‘til you find the right level of pressure. Now I am summarising here
and not talking proper “equestrian” like Hayley, but that was the gist as I
understood it. Sorry, Hayley and all proper equestrians everywhere.
Anyway I got on and I don’t know if you get this feeling
when sitting on a new horse like you’re pitched precariously like a pea on a ball,
but that’s how I felt. Flaire is so comfy and familiar. Stretching out, warming
up and soon into a trot, whoa what’s going on, trying to go in a 20m circle and
we do a hairpin bend. I was being gentle with the legs and forgot about the
mouth! Scary but exciting, I start feeling his moves better and its lovely , my
transitions are pants because I am nervous and Hayley is shouting at me(nicely)
“control yourself women” What is a matter with me I’m doing an alright canter and then collapse down
into trot. Ugh!!. Rise up, she tells me,
instead I am sitting there like a sack of potatoes.
The scary feeling didn’t leave me all that lesson but I
tried everything I was asked even tried squeezing the rein and using my leg to
get Oscar “onto the bit” very technical for me I really don’t know what I am
doing unless I am instructed you know.
Later on I started feeling a bit guilty I didn’t even cast a
glance over towards Flaire as I left I was just running over all the new
feelings riding Oscar. I booked in for Thursday and was on Oscar again and I
was thrilled it went reasonably well, a degree of progress in relation to
riding Oscar as Oscar needed to be ridden, but not entirely pretty. Me not
Oscar ‘cause Oscar is so handsome and now I am in love for real. Given the
choice I would ride Oscar now. But I have discovered something new about myself,
never ever being the dumpee in my courting days ,I always thought of myself as
a loyal stick with it sort of girl. Moving on without a backward glance is an
unchartered territory for me, I will be honest I like it. I didn’t plan it, it
just happened! (well Hayley may have planned it for all I know!) it turned out
to be the right time to try a new challenge. It’s taught me a something about
life in general as horse riding often does, you / we /I can be too comfortable for our own good, so perhaps its time to flirt with change, go on you know you want to.
PS I love you all x
Alison x
3 comments:
Maybe Oscar is how you will progress from "beginner" to "novice"?
Indeed I certainly hope so! thanks for reading x
I have that scary feeling as well. I'd not ridden Spencer since November and I've had him twice in the last 48 hours. I'm finding that when I get a change its that initial getting used to them and its part of the excitement with riding, getting to experience different horses/ponies and seeing what their personalities are like.
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