I swung around the side of the barn and headed for the door — and there he was!

Rebel! Waiting in the aisle for his post-holiday pedicure. I kind of squeaked, ‘Hey!’, and his ears went up, and his mane was a mess, and he let me give him a good scratch.

I got a little giddy: absence may not make the heart grow fonder, but it certainly shuts down the neural pathways that hold all the information about, oh, you know, bucking, and refusing to give the canter depart, and veering towards those puddles that lie tantalisingly on the far side of fences…

Well, we’ll see. Maybe I haven’t been posting so much because I haven’t had anything to give out about…?

I’m too embarrassd to check out when was the last time I checked in.

But, here I am! Still not done with the memoire-based essay book proposal, gotta finish the second sample chapter [on falling; I believe I could write an entire book about that at this stage], and have been sort of hoarding words for that. As I expect to seriously begin looking for a horse – talk about burying the lede – I’m hoarding that experience, too.

Has my horseriding become so circumscribed, then?

Wasn’t sure about the usage of that word, I think the ’scribe’ part got me, but it does indeed apply. I’ve drawn a boundary around my thoughts, it seems, and have corralled them away from the internet. I have to think in long form, now, and it’s actually taking some rewiring of the brain: I’ve been writing anecdotally about the horses for two years now,and it’s taking some effort to tie it all together.

On the other hand, I believe that writing breeds writing, and since I’m still in a state of distractionation, maybe getting back to the blog will create some flow.

Anyway, I’m busily scalping these pages for material – which was the whole point of these pages in the first place – and think I will start posting again. After all, I’m riding four different horses at two different places: surely I’ve got something to say about that?

Oh, yeah, and talking about buying a horse. [This is progress: before it was just thinking about looking for a horse, which on a scale of 1 to 10 for passivity, is 25.]

ACK! Been away so long, WordPress changed their homepage. Freaky!

I suppose ’summer’ is as good an excuse as any, to invoke against sluggishness in blogging. I’ve mostly been spending the time daydreaming about writing my non-fiction horse book, and waiting to go across to England to do a week-long course. The course is done, and the woolgathering mostly finished… I’ve got a full chapter under way, and am in that horrible state that plagues writers — or at least, this writer — that is, the book is no longer a collection of misty images of perfection, but has begun to be wrestled into form. It’s no longer ideal. Now the work begins…

It has been really difficult to blog, since the headspace is entirely different, but not writing anything at all isn’t getting me anywhere. So I’ll say something about Saturday:

The lesson has changed, it’s not fun anymore, there’s all sorts of randomers in it, and it’s been a hassle to get a lift down to the bus. We’re an hour earlier, but last week I still got home at 5 because of the poxy bus.

Amigo, apropos of nothing, bucked me off. No warning. Okay, he’d jittered around for a bit before we got to this fence — was it jittering? I don’t know, it may have been a bit of rodeo, jumping and bucking… my hands were too high, but I sat back and got him to stop — anyway, one minute I was trying to get a decent line in to the straight pole and the next I was flying over his head to land on mine.

My instructor said she’d give me a lift after she’d ridden her own horse for half an hour, and would I ‘wash Amigo down? Don’t be mad at him!’ I wasn’t mad, and I was delighted to give him a soak. I was disappointed, though. I’m running out of horses I can trust. I did the course one last time, on Delilah, and I just can’t ride her anymore, I’ve gone beyond her. Now what?

I know. I know.

So I gave him a bath — note to self: must toss some baby shampoo in the bag — and then, lacking a head collar, lead him around the lanes by the reins, in the sunshine, allowing him a snack now and then, and running my hands over him, checking him for damp.

It was so lovely. So relaxing. The least I could do for the poor dude, after his third hour in a row. I felt grateful, to be able to give him some TLC, and grateful that I wasn’t going to hold that buck against him [he's a lamb, but, damn, when he wants you off, you are gone. Even Tango gives you a bit of notice.] We walked, and I talked to him, and I felt like… like, I want this. I want this time, alone, with a horse. I want to be responsible for the well-being of my own animal. I want to be able to give back in attention what is given to me in work.

Gulp. I don’t think I’m playing at this anymore.

Oh, Tuesday. I had Rebel, we were outside, there was a massive puddle between E and C, and he had decided that it had my name on it.

He was spooking at a teeny tiny one between C and M, and in open order, I kept going back over it, to get him to look at it, ‘It’s just a teeny tiny puddle, dude!’ … with no great success.

He was fighting me for the bit, and when it came to the jumps, I kept him in trot, because we were coming from the A end, and I knew he’d do that dropping-the-shoulder-thing to get me off, and wet.

We managed, although it was a battle after every recovery to get him back on track, to get him back into trot, to get him away from that damned puddle. I lost my balance a fair few times, he refused a fence a split second after I realised he was going to do so [and off I came, but it was dry under the crosspoles] and the whole lesson was a war, but nobody else but me noticed. Well, apart from the falling. [I haven't fallen in ages, and this was a good one, flying right over his head; I still had the reins in my left hand when I landed.]

The turns after the landings were controlled entirely by him, and down went that shoulder, but I did the belly button thing, as scary as it was at the time, and I felt him have to get control of his balance. So score one for me.

I was determined to have him again on Thursday. He’s always better on his own [mostly] and my stubbornness was back.

I had a different instructor that morning. This was not too bad, as I had gone to bed early the night before, feeling poorly. Bolstered with Lucozade, I knew I’d make it through the forty minute hour, and sweat out some of the-whatever-it-was that I’d licked up; as the teacher had never had me before, it was easier to say that I was a little under the weather and didn’t feel like jumping.

I mentioned, apropos of some query or other, that I’d never managed to get him to let his head down enough to collect properly over the bit.

I don’t know how it happened, but that day, he did.

Maybe I do know? It’s may seem an odd line of reasoning, but not feeling 100% may have had something to do with it. I have realised, in the last few weeks, that I ride Reb differently than I ride Amigo or Maurice. On them, because I have seen the effect of it, I immediately have my leg on. I know that with the former [Amigo], he will listen, and with the latter [Maurice], he won’t if I don’t. I have realised that I do not assert myself with Rebel. I allow him to set the tone whilst I’m taking his temperature. In short, he takes the piss out of me because I allow it.

So, feeling somewhat wifty in the head caused me to do the thing that I ought to be doing: I put my leg on right from the start, because I couldn’t count on my brain keeping me in the saddle.

Cue the sun breaking through the clouds, accompanied by a heavenly chorus.

We gave him a good while to stretch out, wake up, and we built the trot up to a lovely, brisk, working one. He gave me some grief, but I didn’t let him away with it — not by rapping him on the arse, but by keeping my arse in and my legs on. I had an excellent contact without holding the reins too tightly [because my LEG WAS ON] and there! There it went! Neck stretched out, head collected — wow!

Now, I wanted to jump!

They weren’t huge, but they weren’t nominal either, and over he went, time after time, beautiful brisk trot towards the fence, not losing pace in the turn, and over, and over, and over — at least sixteen times. I only fell behind him once, because he didn’t like his footwork and compensated at the last possible moment. I was jumping better than I have since Ruby turfed me into the arena door: not thinking, letting him do the work, my hands floating, recovering my seat, a few steps of canter, then flawlessly back down into trot.

Magic! One of those days when I would have gladly jumped forever. We weren’t at war, he listening because I was saying something worth listening to, and there were moments when I did the belly button thing, and I could feel us floating, I could feel him tracking up perfectly underneath me.

This is another good post to read after a bad lesson — particularly one that involve Himself. I want to be able to do this with him all the time — okay, as much as he’ll allow. He’s still Rebel. My instructor and I both wished, at least three times, that she’d had a camera to get some of this recorded. It would be good to see. It would be great to prove that it’s possible to ride this horse without frustration. I know now that it can be done. I know now that there’s a reason to not give up — on him, and on myself.

So I’d been doing all this stuff — sitting on the edge of my seat on the bus, walking around with my elbows loose yet down, standing with my balance entirely in my pelvis — to help me in the saddle. This is as far as my ‘on the ground’ work has gone.

I’d never lunged — longed? It seems to be one or the other — a horse on a long line before.

And I was a bit grumpy about the notion. I had pitched up for my Monday lesson, and as Maurice [this is correct spelling of his name on the 'call sheet', even though the name tag on his stable reads 'Morris'] hadn’t been ridden for four days, he was deemed too fizzy for me.

I was bummed. I really wanted a nice, good trot on him that morning. Even though I’ve gotten a bit bold, not to say cheeky, at Carrickmines, I haven’t put in the nearly the same amount of time at Festina Lente, and I just went, ‘Yeah, great.’

Well, let me tell you something, it’s hard.

Being up on the back of a horse gives you some feeling of control [although as we all well know...], and some feeling of… power. Standing on the ground, in front of an 18hh animal is something else entirely. An 18hh horse with whom you’re sharing a relatively intimate round pen. There’s me, holding a lunging whip, and a red lead line, and there’s Maurice looking at me like, Oh, really? You think so, do you?

I watched first, and it was amazing. The hot spots were pointed out to me — the area in front of his girth which would stop him dead, the section of his flank at which I was meant to aim my belly button [another belly button thing!], and I watched my instructor get him to walk around in circles at her will.

Then it was my turn.

It was exactly like the first time I ever rode him — he didn’t listen to a thing I said, because I wasn’t ’speaking’ clearly. He was happy enough to stop and throw a eye over me every time I unwittingly levelled the navel in front of his girth. I swept the whip as well as I could whilst I was clutching the rest of the lunge line in my left hand, and under instruction, slowly began to get the move precise: a kind of dip down with my outside hip as I moved around with my outside leg planted.

It was hard to do correctly. I eventually got it, somewhat, and learned how to get him back out whenever he turned to look at me after yet another botched communication; I even got him to trot. But let me tell you, my lower back was as exercised as if I’d been cantering for a hour, and my legs were like jelly.

So, it was not a wasted hour. In fact, it was as illuminating as any of the breakthroughs I’ve had in the saddle. And it’s something I definitely need to practice, and become competent at, for when — when — I get my own horse.

ISN’T A WORD, BUT IT IS A STATE OF MIND I’ve gotten a little distracted lately, and have been wallowing in a state of distractination for the last wee while.

Nothing has distracted me from my four lessons per week, and nothing could. I was offered a press trip, and okay, I had some conflicts, conflicts that prevented me from saying yes to a first-class tour of Northern California… but there was also the fact that I would miss like, five or six sessions.

But I’ve also been giving serious thought to writing up a proposal for a non-fiction book about da horses. And it kinda wrecked my head as far as posting is concerned.

First, I had to figure out how to write said proposal. The internet, as always, is something of a mixed blessing. The information is out there, of course, but so much of it conflicts, that I didn’t trust. Time to turn to friends, and friends of friends, and find out what I needed to know. I’m still compiling that knowledge — because, what’s the point of starting if I have to start all over again?

Am I confusing distractination with procrsatination? Hmmm, whadday think?

And then I began the odd spate of note-taking in a notebook, with a pen, and everything. I come over all old-fashioned sometimes. This has been fruitful, but I’m still dawdling enough to have so far failed to transcribe the stuff into a doc. I did create a folder on my desktop called THE HORSE BOOK, so that’s something.

The thing that’s been interfering has been thoughts of the structure of the book, and that’s where the posting has presented a problem. I’m thinking discrete essays that have several narrative threads in common. Unless I get a whack of money and can buy a horse, I’m going to have to come up with some other stuff with which to pitch. Because, you see, the idea is to get a helpful advance so that I can buy the horse and then write about it…

It’s a gamble, but the whole point of starting this blog — in the beginning, before I knew how much I would enjoy this — was to make a book. And if I don’t post, I won’t have some material to plumb when the thing starts going.

So, I settled into distractination, and nothing got done.

Looks like things are about to change — to change back, and to go forward.

REBEL HAS THEM And he wasn’t nearly as excited as I would have been. Plus: pedicure! Ah, well, he’s no metrosexual — despite being a gelding and all.

BECAUSE IT FEELS BETTER The last few jumps on Thursday were over an oxer. I seek to use the correct terms, and I suppose an oxer is an oxer is an oxer, but this was, maybe, if I was pushing it, eighteen inches wide. [There had been some sort of crazy series of fences set up, and the first two were too close together to be a bounce, so it had to be an oxer, and it was DEEP.]

Anyway, we took it in the trot, and it was mostly kind of lacklustre, until the last one: I stopped thinking, and we made a good run for it, and I felt it, perfectly, I folded and rose with Rebel, as he powerfully rose up over the poles, I felt myself meet him, perfectly, and land, perfectly, together.

Over the fence, I was unthinkingly aware, in the instant, of everything being right, of my arms moving up just so, of my hands staying steady, of my shoulders going forward, of the feeling that the two of us were in perfect harmony, that I knew it looked right, because it felt right. I didn’t need the ‘Goooood!’ hollered from the ground, but it was lovely to hear, all the same.

Thing are much better in the jumping department. The thing is, I’m back to not thinking about it again. I’m convinced that I had been doing so badly for the previous six months because I had been thinking about it so much. But I suppose I had to think about it to be able to, eventually, forget about it. If I hadn’t been thinking about it, all the bits of it — the legs, the position, my hands — then I wouldn’t be able to not think about it, which I am doing now. Meaning that now my body just knows things. And even if I am coming up the long side, looking at the fence, and in my head I’m reminding myself to keep my leg on and not grab with my knees, for example, the awareness of the need to adjust doesn’t come from my brain. And if there’s a running monologue, it’s in my body; my body’s awareness is reminding me to look up, to wait, wait, wait, fold, and sit up. I’m able to forget about all of it because the processing is shared out evenly between my mind and my body, and this essentially allows me to get out of my own way.

Oh, you know what I mean…

Last Tuesday was great. Perfectly sunny, perfect blue sky, and we went up to the upper arena to jump.

I had Amigo, and I think he likes it up there. I sure do. It’s the perfect balance between being outside and being up in the mountains. I’m still a bit leery of the highest hill, and suppose at some stage will be back up it, but for now, the upper arena is an excellent compromise.

You can see for miles. You can see the miles and miles away to where I live. The whole of Dublin Bay is below, and you can see out over the Irish Sea. The hills flow down to the water — it feels as though the entire east coast of Ireland is at your feet. You jump and jump, and stop, and look out, and being up on the back of a horse makes it all the more glorious.

We got some good jumps in, too, I’m feeling Amigo’s approach better, and only fell behind on one fence. He seemed less… unsure of the fences, maybe it’s all that air and space. Once I could kind of forget about him, and what I thought he was gonna do or not do, I just let him do it, and we went really well…

But then came the pony parade…