Days Of Summer

Unfortunately with the move we had to take, I was forced to sell TonTon to a friend not too long ago. I get updates on occasion and I hear that she is doing very well under saddle. I don't have any doubt of that...she's usually got a level head. She's smart and needs a challenge and hates being bossed around sometimes, but she's level headed about it.

I now reside in a small townhouse here in Grove City, Ohio. We're in the midst of everything here...everything but horses, it seems. Although Trent is still trying to get me a job at a local sulky track, I'm not looking to be very hopeful on the outcome. My work hours are terrible due to daycare being $200+ for one week, and so the horse industry will just have to wait.

Selling Taunie was a little harder than I expected. I wasn't really attached to the mare and I knew that I was going to sell her sooner or later, but selling Taunie would mean the unwelcomed departure of the equine world and the onset of reality. Reality that I am now a Stay-At-Home mom. No, its not my calling. Yes, I actually love my "job". I truly do. But I get bored. I get lonely. I find myself wishing on things that used to be, longing for them, wishing that I didn't take them for granted. I know that I will be able to resume my equine passions to a certain extent in the general future...maybe a few years from now. But it will never be what I was working for.

And do you see? I sound as though I hate my life, but I actually love my life. I chose this life, I made sacrifices to live this life, and I will fight for this life. I continue to build on this life and surround my energy and focus on it. But it isn't all I am and I tend to struggle with that on a day to day basis.

Anyways, if I continue this blog regularly now since I have the internet, be warned that it might not be about horse training. It might be about just everyday life and its frustrations and triumphs. But thats if I decide to keep it. If not...then I'll guess I'll see you guys when I pick up riding again, whenever that may be.

Green When The Ground Is White

Tonton has been doing well, despite being ridden maybe once or twice a month. She's fat and out in the pasture now, chillin' with her home-hosses and collecting dust...I mean snow.

A month or two ago I asked someone to take a video if us for a friend's curiosity and so this be it:



Not much to show, but she's made progress from just a couple weeks before that. She was in this habit of cowkicking at the trot almost every stride, or kicking out when I added my leg in response to her slowing down. She's trotting nicely and politely because she now knows theres something worse...the canter!

I've cantered her a few times on the trail and she did wonderful. At first she wasn't so sure, but once we got going...she found out just how much fun riding could be. She'd bound over ditches, leap across puddles, spook at the dogs...all the while her ears were up and I could just hear her yell "WOO!" I, of course, was just along for the ride. Who am I to get in the way of safe fun?

I go to the barn every Friday, if not then Saturday and since I'm training horses for board, I have very little time to work Taunie. I've made it a New Years resolution to get her show ready by summer though. Whether she goes to a show or not is another thing...but at least she'll be trained for one by then.