How poor are they that have not patience! What wound did ever heal but by degrees? ~ Shakespeare
The abscess, for, dear Reader, ’twas an abscess indeed, emerged last Thursday. Thus ensued five days of poultice, cloth, vetwrap, and boot for the foot; standing wraps to support the legs; and cold hosing to calm the inflammation. Oh, and cookies, to get Rocky through this difficult time.
His leg is still a little bit swollen but tonight I’ve decided not to do the standing wrap. I know if I’d been poulticed and wrapped for a week I would be more than ready to have my legs free all night. I did hose and wrap the foot and put the medicine boot on it. Just in case there’s a chance of keeping it somewhat clean.
Here’s where the thing came out:
Treatment staging area (the Adequan is not related to the abscess, but it was Monthly Injection Day):
I wrapped the injured leg and the poulticed foot; the medicine boot’s strap is broken so I fell back on the duct tape. Jan did her first standing wrap on the supporting leg, beautifully:
This experience made me realize that my horsecare knowledge is 20 years out of date, and that I don’t remember enough from my horse husbandry class in college to be of much use to my equines now. I don’t want to remain dependent on the Erins, Donnas, and Jennis of the world indefinitely. I know I have a horse medical/veterinary reference around here somewhere but it’s not layperson-friendly, so I indulged my inner Hermione and ordered two books based on recommendations from Jessica Jahiel’s Holistic Horsemanship website. I’m gleefully devouring them, although so far I haven’t read anything specific to abscesses.
Horsekeeping on a Small Acreage: Designing and Managing Your Equine Facilities
Horsekeeping Almanac: The Essential Month-by-Month Guide for Everyone Who Keeps or Cares for Horses
Yesterday morning, Rocky’s right hind leg was swollen and hot all the way up to his inner thigh.
He was glum about it.
Oh boy, I thought, in perfect Linda manner. An opportunity to practice treating thermal edema! (I’m not sure that’s the correct medical term for “hot swelling” but it sounds good.)
I ran my hands gently up and down the leg and in the crisp morning air it felt like touching a space heater. No sign of a cut, bump, bite, bruise, lump, or a big red circle around the words Injury Here.
Every horseperson I know tells me that they learned to do wraps, whether polo or pressure or standing, by doing it a thousand times. I stood there with padding, wrap, plastic cling wrap, bute, and poultice, and played the warnings through my mind. Wrap toward the spine or you could bow a tendon. Keep the pressure exactly even all the way. Don’t let a wrinkle form, that could constrict a blood vessel. Better to leave unwrapped than to make a mistake in the wrapping. (This article has more tips and warnings.)
I’ve practiced wrapping as an Activity, just to learn how and to get Rocky unconcerned about it. I’ve been directly tutored and had my wraps checked after. But this week is my first time wrapping a truly injured leg, with no one to monitor me. I did ask advice from Donna, who learned her wrapping expertise in thousands of miles of endurance racing, and she gave me great information and encouragement. But when it came to treating the leg, I Did It All By Myself.
I started with 15 minutes of cold hosing. As usual, Rocky supervised.
I rubbed in a poultice of epsom salt and something menthol-like. (I think it’s Durvet Epsom Salt Poultice but the label on the barn jar a bit worn so I could be wrong.) The gummy texture made it difficult to coat the leg with any sort of evenness, but I tried to massage and swirl and at least get the epsom salts in there. Warm water added to the jar helped a bit.
I played some friendly game with the saram wrap, including putting a carrot in the box and bending the razor edge out of the way so Rocky could explore it with his lips. I then set it down for a while next to his hay and played some porcupine games with his halter, then scratched around the base of his ears. This sounds innocent, but this horse came to me with a fear of having hands anywhere near his ears.
By the time I pulled out a length of plastic wrap to put around his leg, Rocky no longer cared about the weird crinkling sounds. (Yes, it’s about two years past time I replaced the savvy string on my carrot stick with a plastic bag, and looped the savvy string around my wrist.)
I couldn’t keep it totally smooth and that evening I had a heart-pounding few hours of wondering if I’d botched the whole thing and injured him permanently with a wrinkle in the wrong place.
Over the plastic, the soft pillow wraps that feel so good in the hand but also refuse to flatten smoothly around a horse leg. And over that, the stretchy wrap. It took me an hour and fifteen minutes to satisfy myself that I had the proper balance of snug support that wasn’t straining the tendon or pressing wrinkled inner layers against his flesh. I lost count of how many times I wrapped, unwrapped, re-rolled the bandage, and started over. Erin and the vet both suggested wrapping the normal leg too, to give it some support as it’s taking most of his weight. That one only took 15 minutes.
One of the earlier attempts, the first one I considered leaving on:
The one I finally did go with, even though I left a lot of padding sticking out the top:
I was pleased this morning that both wraps had stayed on. The mud disguised the left one at first and I thought he’d unraveled it in the night, but a closer look saved me from a fruitless search of the pasture.
Despite all this, he was still hot and swollen today. Dr. White will come out in the morning and take a look.
I just got the email to gold savvy club members that one of our 2010 benefits will be ambassador training, free. SQWEEEE! I’ve wanted to become an official Parelli ambassador since before they announced any formal plan or program for it — and I was this close <> to applying for their social media integration position, until I realized that I couldn’t afford to take it, if I got the offer. Ha.
This week I’ve been playing with Rocky in the rain, asking him to trust me enough to wade through the creek instead of leap the ditch, while I hold my Flip cam up at him. This has resulted in some interesting adventures although not necessarily usable footage. (I love saying footage for digital video — like saying “above the fold” to describe website layout.) I need one more session to show our success, so that I can cobble together a minute of before, during, after.
Salsa is doing a lot better at haltering himself now that we’re being more “evade the bump” and less “evade the halter.” I’ll explain that in a future post too.
I haven’t booked lodging yet even though they’ve announced the Savvy Summit conference dates, but it looks like gold members can attend free, depending on what restrictions apply. This is gonna be a good horse year. No matter what.
I bundled up and went out with my book, folding chair, and lighted baseball cap in hopes of spending 30 to 60 minutes of undemanding time with the horses. It was 11:30pm when I got to their night turnout and I thought good, I won’t be competing with their dinner. I can just tuck in by that tree and read and we’ll all drowse together.
I didn’t realize I would be competing with the boredom of the midnight pasture. I barely found my dog-eared page when Rock was over chewing on the posts of my chair, whuffling my hair, licking my jacket, and nuzzling my shoulders. I waved my arms around to stop him from chewing the chair, but then it became a game not of “how do I keep her arms still” but rather “how do I make her wave her arms.” Any time I wasn’t flapping, he was chewing. He even lowered his head so he could chew the chair legs when my elbows made it uncomfortable to chew the seat back. I tried projecting driving energy at him but he was behind me and I was not effective.
It was the sit-down equivalent of porcupine game, and waving my arms might as well have been moving my feet.
At the same time, Salsa came up in front and stared. We’ve been working on turn-and-face-is-the-only-safe-place, and I guess he took the lesson to heart. Stare. Stare. Stare. Stare. Stare. Eventually, tentatively, a tiny pony muzzle found its way to my book and blocked my view. I petted it.
Eventually, I gave up on reading — I think I managed two pages the entire time — and scratched Rocky on the face, muzzle, and neck. Then I carried the chair and blanket back outside the gate. I can read standing up and I could lean on the tree…which of course made Rocky start backing up, gently and carefully, for a butt scratch. I spent the last 15 minutes alternating between scratching his buttcrack and scratching Salsa along his crest and shoulders.
I remember a time when Rocky didn’t want to be near me, and when he withdrew inside when I sat down in his pen. This was much better and it warmed my heart, if not my fingers or toes.
It usually takes me more than three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech ~ Mark Twain
And what do I write, when I haven’t done anything, and yet so much has happened? Undemanding time to heal our bond, a vet appointment to map out a pain management strategy, and a handful of family walks. Our first full circle at Liberty with rhythm, relaxation, and contact — in the arena, no less. Giving rides to 10-year-old girls, including hopping up on the pedestal with all four feet and then looking expectantly around for a treat.
The neighborhood walks have been good for us all, although I noticed I spent more time standing while he grazed once we got to the school. That’s not exercise! Some neighborhood kids came running over though to pet the horses and that was good socialization for Salsa.
Rocky will take himself to the pedestal any time he feels confused, resistant, or playfully defiant. I have stalled for so long in our patterns, still just starting level 3 on-line and level 1 liberty, but sporadically and not in the round pen.
I did consult with Dr. White today about whether I can use bute for Rocky on the occasional basis — when I’m going ride, for example, which I barely have been doing even once a week. He said it would take about an hour for the bute to take effect and then it would last for about 12 hours. (I am building a mini-site for Dr. White at BearRiverAnimalDoc.com.)
Seeing as I am Rocky’s perfect match, as we’re going to do trails and gentle arena patterns, with not a lot of speed or sharp turning, this will be a good strategy going forward. I’ll give him food with it and we’ll spend that hour warming up by stretching, moseying, and walking around the neighborhood (and not stopping at the school to graze, but really walking the whole mile, as I am so tired of being unfit and lost). He will be happy to be back into progress and provocativeness.
In the meantime, I am traveling so much in January that I took advantage of Erin’s “winter maintenance special” and have Rocky in development with her. She will play with him twice a week this month so I don’t have to worry about him while I’m bouncing around from client site to client site. (Leslie will be here to take care of the place and the other animals.)
I was able to watch the first session yesterday and it was so cute to watch him concentrating and learning — and then glancing at me with an “is this right?” question on his face. Top it off with Centella mirroring his every move, at Liberty … priceless.
Salsa is being more snotty with me than ever, as I have neglected our relationship since what, Thanksgiving? That’s the ebb and flow of life in a freelancer’s herd, I guess. He has bonded closely with Jan, though, and has made it clear that he is Jan’s Pony. So, okay, I bought the new levels; Jan can start with him on her spring break.
It snowed a little while I was out of town, but has rained nonstop since my return on Wednesday — that’s 41 hours of steady rain so far, most of it pouring. Rock and Salsa are in their raincoats 24/7, and they have begun their winter routine of days in the individual feeding pens and nights in the big turnout in the front.
Salsa wasn’t too sure about the whole blanket thing when we tried it on before the rains began.
Our neighbor generously lets us use his land and that’s where Rocky mostly stays, but we learned last winter that the back 40 gets too muddy to be safe during the wet months. Rocky lost nine shoes to the sucking mud and we only found six, and his hooves got overly soft from never having relief from the mud. Erin and her team did a lot of maintenance on the property this fall to improve the drainage and prevent the erosion, so it’s looking a lot better than it did last year, but why take chances?
So now they get to be in individual pens during the day, and the front turnout at night. This is excellent especially for Rocky who could use some exposure. The back 40 is the biggest pen and I love that he gets to live there but at the same time it’s in the back of the ranch and he doesn’t get exposed to the road, the oat pellet delivery truck, the silo, people coming and going, etc. Where he is now, he can watch the comings and goings of the whole ranch.
Tomorrow I’m going to take both horses into the covered arena to spend a few hours naked in the sand, let them roll and roll and roll until the itchy of the blanket is erased. Rocky was making camel faces today when I scratched around all the edges so I know he needs it. Salsa is back to acting aloof and even disdaining me, as I have spent so little time with him in the past few weeks. Work and travel mostly, the weather partly.
However.
Today I bought a warm head thingie for ears and forehead, a fleece-lined knit hat, and the thickest gloves I’ve had since my childhood snow mittens. The gloves have some grippy stuff on the fingers and palms so I can actually hold brushes and hoof pics. They’re all high-tech, so they will be good for the teen- and twenty-something temperatures when the only horsetime I get is evening. I figure with this new gear, my Toasties, and my merino wool base layer, I have no excuse for falling off the program just because it’s cold or wet or dark.
Meanwhile my Patterns maps just sit there on the wall without any new checks, and my horses lose respect the longer I appear planless… although isn’t undemanding time a big part of the plan, too? Recent Parelli article said it’s one of the most important and most underused arrows in our quivers. I believe it still counts if I bring them into the arena for UDT; it doesn’t have to be in the pasture or turnout. It’s just that when I decide to segue into demanding time, I need to get back on the patterns program again.
I should make a blog category called “fell off the patterns again” because I know I do this at least once a month.
Erin and I talked about some writing projects we want to collaborate on and then from there ended up in the arena with Rocky and then Erin on the end of the line … and boy did Rocky (and I!) learn a lot.
On the Ground
She brought up his life with some trotting, traveling with him so that the circles were large and not too stressful on his front feet. Then she shifted her energy, instantly, and tossed the rope at him, as a friendly game. And he tensed in that pre-explosion freeze of the RBI. He would fling his head up and brace, and if he started to go inward, she jerked the line, hard but in rhythm 1-2-3, to bring him out of it. I think that’s the first time I’ve seen a “thanks, I needed that!” performed in person, and Rocky’s facial expression was priceless. A combination of irritation (“but I was going to my happy place!”) and surprise (“what are you doing?”) and anxiety (“what am I supposed to do instead?”).
She used the three principle games to teach him a new response to stimuli.
Friendly Game
She tossed the rope over his back and slid it off toward her, in rhythm, not especially hard but not wimpy either. She kept her energy loose and soft and even whistled a tune to emphasize that this was all friendly. (I can’t whistle lately, it’s so dry and cold, but I sing a lot when I ride, so I will sing instead of whistle when I play friendly.) He tried several things. Tense, freeze, leap, fling head up, pull back, brace, resist. None of that stopped the stimuli. And he couldn’t retreat inside because she would see the beginning of it and cause it not to happen.
Porcupine Game
She applied a bit of pressure on the line to show him that if he lowers his head, the stimulus stops. This is a familiar game to him, as I have done this as part of our “follow the feel” practice. When he followed the feel, he created slack in the line and the rope-tossing stopped. If the rope was on his back at that point, she left it there, so that she didn’t add stimulus by sliding it off. She waited for the lick and chew before starting again. In this way he learned that while all of his other strategies didn’t work, this new strategy did. It took him a long time to learn to do it on his own — much longer than it usually takes for him to learn something new, which showed just how worried he was. But I was just bursting with pride, because I could see him start to figure it out, licking and chewing like a kid on Halloween, concentrating with his full attention on Erin and then occasionally flicking an ear and eye toward me with a “is this okay?” question.
Driving Game
After he started to get the idea that this is what we were doing (and that he wasn’t going to get out of school early), she added some driving. She would intensify her energy to drive his hindquarters or ribs away as needed, using the rope. Then when he moved appropriately, she immediately dropped her energy into friendly, tossing the rope. She showed me that at this stage, she was giving him some time to figure out the difference, and was not expecting him to instantly respond appropriately to driving and then to friendly. She was teaching him what happens before what happens happens, being consistent with her energy and her timing.
On the Horse
I’ve wanted Erin to ride Rocky for a long time now, for several reasons, including to get her take on his soundness and soreness levels and to see if he did the same “but I don’t WANNA go forward” with her than he has started doing with me. I’ve been wondering if the balking was because I, deep inside, didn’t really want him to go forward. Or if it was because a rider on his back takes the ache in his feet from minor annoyance to actual pain.
I did tell him the other day that I have plantar fasciitis (chronically inflamed tendons from heel to toe) and metatarsalgia (which just means “pain in toes/ball of foot” but isn’t it a cool word?) and possibly a bone spur in my left heel, and that playing with him on the ground in the sand of the arena is painful for me and almost excruciating later (mornings especially, as the tendons have all night to get tight and inflamed). I said, “I empathize with you, but you’re the one who gets Adequan!” Heheh.
Go
He did balk with Erin at first and she even said something about him preparing for a buck — I said no, he would never be so rude — and of course he did not buck. He’s a NICE horsey. Or maybe remembers being brutalized for such behaviors by a previous human, and so he holds it in. (I suppose as he gets more confident he will feel free to express himself in that manner, but so far he has restrained himself.)
She stayed consistent with her phases and once he started going, he went along pretty well. She rode in the bareback pad and halter, with the 12-foot line tied into reins. She used the reins only after he didn’t respond to her body, and when she used rein, she used only one at a time. She has a way of holding the rein at the midpoint and then using the other hand to lift or bump the left or right if necessary. He had a nice walk and a nice jog and did not bob his head or limp or go uneven on the straight lines. A small circle change of direction did cause him to be off, so she advised that I not ride him in anything smaller than the arena, and do my direction changes in a wide arc and across the diagonal. More like a yin-yang symbol than a circle or small figure 8.
She had him canter, too, and he was smooth and slow, and she was surprised at how well he collected himself up, as she wasn’t asking him for Collection. I told her how much effort Jenni put into teaching Rocky to engage his hind end and “push” rather than scramble his front end and “pull” (thank you, Jenni!). He used to canter so heavily on the front end, it felt like he was just churning his legs in an effort not to fall on his face. He still has much more trouble cantering to the right but even that is much improved — I could see him bringing his hind legs much further under his belly than he used to, even to the right, and that made me feel good about his current lifestyle.
It is the first time he has cantered with a rider since we moved here a year ago, what with all the lost shoes, then barefoot transition, arthritis, and two months of thrush, plus my own worry that I am not good enough to be in harmony with him and I don’t want to be a burden or put him off cantering.
Whoa
Erin showed me the difference between riding (go) and not-riding (whoa). Rocky did not respond to her body at all, so she used one rein for a stop-and-back. She had to go to phase 3 for that, which meant the snap was clocking him on the jaw, giving him aural as well as physical feedback. She said if he responded in any way, even just an ear flick, to the change in her body, she just picked up the rein until he stopped and she didn’t ask him to back, and they had a rest until he licked and chewed (or got distracted by something else). But for no response, he got a firmer signal, because her goal was to teach him — say it with me — what happens before what happens happens. She chose to back rather than just halt because that also made her message more clear.
She said he is easy to stop, he just hasn’t learned the body cue, so I am to work hard at making my energy and body language clear and consistent and to give him some time — about three seconds — to respond to my body before I pick up the rein. Again, I will practice in simulation before I practice on him. (I’m practicing right now, on the stability ball I use for an office chair.)
She also exaggerated her fluidity movements for me so that I could see the difference between going with him, going ahead of him, going behind him, and not going. She breathes out, audibly and completely, when she stops riding, and said that some horses get so tuned in to the breath that they’ll stop even if all you do is sigh heavily. I say “Whooooaaaaaaaa” and she said it’s fine to keep using the verbal cue. Rocky is an extremely verbal horse, which will be an advantage if he loses his sight, and “whoooaaaaa” is handy to use when on the ground as well.
Ride, Regina, Ride
She said he felt very good on the straight lines and fine on the wide turns. I am cleared to ride! She agreed with me that combining arena with ranch trails would give us a lot of interesting terrain and straight lines to play with. It’s a balancing act between circulation (good!) and inflammation (bad!). We also talked about judicious use of pain management such as bute or equiox or banamine, using it sparingly and only on days when I ride. I’ll talk to Dr. White about the options as I do not want to relieve one problem only to create others, like ulcers or kidney damage.
Even on my best weeks I only ride a few times a week, and my Ultimate Riding Goal is pretty simple: trail riding, hanging out at the ranch, savvy play days. Lots of walking, and very few sharp turns or tight circles. (No barrel racing for us, not even Parelli-style.) I am feeling hopeful again about riding as giving him a day off between rides is totally fine — my challenge will be riding him as frequently as every other day! — and treating the pain issues appropriately on an as-needed basis.
Not long ago, I posted five questions about providing language and leadership on The Walk, questions I intended to ask Erin in my next lesson (Location-Based Relationships, 11/10/09). Once again we have not managed to synch our schedules and so I have not had a lesson with her. However, continuing to putter along in the journey has given me some answers, for now and to build on as we move forward.
Am I shoving Rocky off cliffs with my approaches to various thresholds or am I respecting the thresholds and helping him gain confidence?
I must be handling at least most of the thresholds appropriately, as he has been meeting me at the gate even during hay time, and bumping the halter with his nose in a very obvious “let’s go let’s go” way. He asked me questions several times during our family walk on Friday.
When he planted all feet and flipped his head up to look, I looked where he looked, and gave him some time, and then when he started to relax, I would apply a little bit of pressure and say “Okay let’s keep going” and he would fall into place behind or beside me.
This pressure was not always physical, as I use our verbal cue of “Ready? Let’s go!” first, and then I would take a step or two with slack in the line. (This is in preparation for his losing his sight entirely. Sigh.) When that didn’t work, he did get a bit of porcupine game on his poll. He never once resisted stepping forward, nor did he leap about or spaz or get less trusting as the walk continued.
I think looking where he looks is a good strategy, better than continuing to focus on down the trail. When I look, I show him that I respect his alertness, evaluate the situation, and answer his unspoken question: Is it safe? Yes, it’s safe.
How much can I allow him to eat of the grasses and plants along the way without making him sick?
He can snack for two hours of walking and end up with things a bit green and soft, but with no ill effects. (Note to self: Find way to rig a harness so he can carry his own muck shovel, if we go back to eat at the restaurant outdoor tables again.)
How can I be more effective about enforcing the rule of walking behind me (knowing that Rocky spent 7 years being taught to put the human in Zone 2 before I got him)?
I decided to try it his way and walk in zone 2 (shoulder), and sometimes even take the initiative to walk in zone 3 (ribs). I used driving game with the rope as needed and hopefully my intention of “I’m leading you from the place where I’d be sitting if I were mounted” came through, rather than “you’re in charge ’cause you’re in front.” He still looked to me for direction and he did not crowd me. When I wiggled the rope to yo-yo him back or at least to slow him so I could move to zone 1, he responded well. The drawback to this is that when on the ground, I cannot see over him, so I can’t quite simulate riding — I can only see half of our environment.
Is it dangerous to allow Rocky, specifically, to power into fast trot, canter, and gallop on the uneven ground at the school?
Yes. He stepped in a hole at the walk and had to wrench his foot out just a little bit. Had he been going faster, he might have fallen or worse. So henceforth the school fields are a walk-only zone. We can save the higher gaits for the trails along the way and at the park, the arena in the park (when I find it; I know it’s there, though, somewhere!), and here at the ranch.
How do I “match his energy” or “match his energy and add four ounces” effectively?
This one still eludes me. It’s a matter of getting it out of my brain and into my body, though, which means practice, and being patient with however long it takes. I notice that I tend to “flap” rather than “move” — that is, I can wave arms or do jumping jacks or whatever, but it’s a lot of flurry of limbs without much core intensity to it. Erin moves slower but with much more intensity, so I shall have to stalk her and mimic her as best I can. And of course watch more of Pat and Linda. Maybe more dancing and Pilates, which would solve a lot of things, not just horse body language. Heh.
There’s just a song in all the trouble and the strife you do the walk you do the walk of life
On Friday, we went for another family walk: 1 horse, 1 pony, 1 dog, 5 humans. This time we didn’t just walk the half mile to the school–we went all the way to Western Gateway Park to rest by the creek. On the way back, we stopped at a restaurant for burgers. Half the town stopped by to ask if they could pet our horses! (Seriously, if you need a babe magnet, a pony works even better than a puppy. Who knew?)
This little lunch break included a quick jaunt to the hardware store across the road for a snow shovel, as Rocky decided to make it very clear that a) he is not afraid to stand next to restaurant tables under an overhang between a wall and several support posts and b) grazing on walks does indeed have an effect on the digestion.
But oh, what a walk. And extra cool is that Krisen brought her pocket camera and shot some photos along the way.
Salsa playing “halter? what’s a halter?” with Jan:
You know that Parelli patterns “do it seven times” thing? The one where they tell us that around the fourth or fifth session, something clicks in the horse and he starts to get it and engage and offer and relax? Yup.
Here’s Rocky walking all calm and interested through the squeeze between the neighborhood and the wooded hill behind the school. (The cute guy is Josh, the photographer’s boyfriend.)
Walking up the hill, Rocky got a little antsy, probably just to keep his reputation intact:
And Rocky behaved for Josh while I took a bathroom break:
This weekend marks the one year anniversary of my move from Los Angeles to Penn Valley, returning to a climate where trees change color:
Walking as long as we did, and stopping for lunch in a shopping center, gave Rocky plenty of time to work through his initial burst of “ack we’re leaving home base!” and get into “hey cool another neat thing to look at.” I am reassured that when we join Erin and her students on trail rides in 2010, he will enjoy himself, even if we have to be ponied for the first 20 minutes. He played at the edge of the creek and took a drink, he took a slim branch in his mouth and shook it to make all the leaves fall off, he nuzzled people’s pockets and obliged the little girls who wanted to pet him.
Salsa-the-formerly-starving lives for grazing, but does look around with ears perked. Nothing spooks him.
I didn’t realize I was decked out in Parelli clothing until this photo of Dan, Jan, and I. Note the pony noses in the background.
On the way back, reaching the school and the footbridges that bookend the squeeze path, Rocky got even calmer. What had been off home base was now part of familiar territory.
We all got fresh air, exercise, food, and relaxation therapy, and I look forward to doing it again!
I know what I know I’ll sing what I said we come and we go that’s a thing that I keep in the back of my head
All I pay my psychiatrist is the cost of feed and hay, and he’ll listen to me any day ~ Old Saw
Suddenly overcome with the sadness (it doesn’t matter why), I sank down to a cavaletti before I fell down. We had been just hanging out in the arena, getting reacquainted after my intense workweek, playing a few Liberty games here and there.
I was curled tight down into myself, already checked out, and then this velvet softness brushed against my head. I grunted but couldn’t move and then he did it again, lips busily inspecting my hair. I looked up and smiled at him, through tears, and told him he was an awesome horse, which of course set me off again. Sob sniffle sob sob sniffle.
He flicked an ear at me, then walked around me, stepping daintily over the cavaletti. For a horse who does not seem to know where his feet are — who had been trapped twice already with his foot between the two pedestals — he lifted them high and set them down gently.
I whispered “good job” but was unable to stop crying, so I put my face back down in my arms where he wouldn’t see.
Nudge. He pushed his nose against my back, hard enough that I swayed forward, but not enough to hurt. Nudge. NUDGE.
Yup. He kept nudging, not hard but insistent, with rhythm (hrm, how interesting!), until I actually got to my feet and stood all the way up. Then he stepped forward, put me at his left shoulder, blew gently out his nose, and gave me the “let’s do something fun” eye.
Who am I to blow against the wind?
I squared my shoulders and smiled and said okay, and we played in a relaxed and libertyesque manner, and it was good.
My horse’s feet are as swift as rolling thunder
He carries me away from all my fears
And when the world threatens to fall asunder
His mane is there to wipe away my tears.
~Bonnie Lewis
At the very end, I put a halter and rein on him just for my own psychological need and climbed up onto his furry warm naked bony back, and sat there, trying to relax everything and just fluidly move with him across the arena to lick rails on the other side. I breathed deeply and pushed my weight back to balance as I leaned forward and hugged him.
Good boy.
I went to the Parelli Savvy Club forum today to ask for opinions on Salsa’s ethnicity and got great responses! Also it drew the mini/pony people into the thread so now I have more contacts specific to Salsa.
His Shetland qualities include the sturdy frame, the double coat, and the “general air of vitality (presence), stamina and robustness” characteristic of the breed.
His Mini qualities include his Appaloosa coloring and I think despite having a sturdy frame, his head and feet are smaller than the original Shetlands (vs the sleek, refined American Shetlands which don’t look like Shetlands at all to me).
I ordered a blanket for him the other day and according to the measuring tape, he’s 9.1 to 10 hands high, about 350 pounds, and 52 inches from center of chest to center of buttcrack.
Cute pony!
With Rock, I practiced “sending with draw” tonight and sort of got the hang of how it works. I tried to keep the right balance of intensity, rest, variety, and mosey. And I kept to my re-instated policy of no cookies if you’re frisking me for them, no cookies for easy stuff, and yes cookies if you stand parallel to the fence and stay there while I rest my legs on you. At one point while I had a leg on him he began to paw vigorously. I have no idea if it was frustration at not getting 15 more cookies or if it was an invitation to get on his back — kind of a “get on already and let’s go do something” impatience.
I wanted to slide onto him at that point, but something held me back. Not fear. But anxiety. I don’t think he would bolt or buck or rear, as he’s never done any of those things with me on him, and in fact even if he spooks, he spooks in place first. He has always taken care of me when I’m on him. In fact, once when I started to slip, he shrugged me back into the saddle.
Yet, tonight, I realized that I didn’t trust him! How can I expect him to trust me, if I don’t trust him? My hesitation was more that I’m not sure if I would hurt him, as he has no muscle tone in his back, and his front feet are (as usual) a bit off. And yet, I did not trust him to let me know simply by wincing. I felt like I had no idea how he would react, if I eased myself up there and accidentally prodded his tender spots.
I sat there on the fence panel for a long time, while he stood parallel and licked the railings in that meditative way that he does. What did I really think he would do? Worst case, couldn’t I just slide off? (Maybe not easily, in those full-seat Polartec breeches.) In all the time I’ve been developing this partnership, he has never done anything that threatened my safety. Ever. Even on The Walk, even once long ago when we were brand new and he was terrified of a tractor, he was aware of where I stood and did not run over or through me.
I wonder what he was thinking about while he massaged his tongue on the rails and while I thought deeply about trust.
When I brought Salsa in to play with figure 8 and our first level 2 touch-it, Rocky did not want to relinquish the pedestal. I had to drive him away three times before he stayed at a safe distance. (The look on his face was priceless, too. “That’s MY platform!”)
Salsa did the figure 8 just fine, even with the cavaletti in the middle, all of 10 inches high. He also caught on real fast that pawing the pedestal doesn’t count but getting two feet on it does.
I risked allowing Rocky to step up there too, with me between them, and then I drove them both off.
I experimented some more with encouraging their ideas (“you wanna go that way? great! go that way faster!”) and with Rocky, sending with some draw in my aura; if I got even a quarter circle with the bend in his body and his facial expression saying “when do I get to come in?” I invited him in. And when he went out a little wider and a little wilder and didn’t look at me, I kept my energy up to move him until he did look at which point I instantly relaxed into friendly invitation — and he came in, all three times. By the end of our session he managed almost a complete circle with good focus on me and not breaking gait. I was so proud, especially as we were in the covered arena (too big but with sodium vapor lights), not the round pen (right size but pitch black).
Children can be fearless because they’re typically focused on horses and having fun; they really don’t know or understand what can happen. Adults tend to be more fearful because they do know and they do understand what can happen. There’s a big difference between a child thinking, “If I fall off I’ll get dirty” and an adult “If I fall off I could become seriously injured and have expensive medical bills and be unable to work and lose my job and have to give up my horse.”
~ Dr. Jessica Jahiel, Riding Instructor Magazine, Winter 2008-2009
I was always afraid even as a child. Now I know it’s because I was leaning forward and therefore always off balance and therefore insecure and therefore afraid. All I had to do was hold up my head, look where I was going, open my hips, and sit deep in the saddle, but of course, I didn’t know how and if my instructors were trying to teach me to do it I couldn’t comprehend through the fog of fear.
But my fear then truly was “oh no I could fall off and then the instructor will be disappointed in me or maybe even mad.” I probably also worried about getting hurt, but I know the fear of disappointing the adult by not achieving was stronger than the fear of physical pain.
Now, though, this quote describes it perfectly. Small thing to medium thing to large thing, and the whole trail of things strung together between one heartbeat and the next. And yet each one of those things is true. And I’m self-employed, so while I do have health insurance, I do not have sick days or vacation days to use while I’m recovering. I had enough emergencies in the past two years that my emergency fund (and, alas, my emergency credit line) are stretched too.
I literally cannot afford to get hurt.
But I’m not afraid anymore, either.
Sometimes I wonder if Rocky and I are the home-bound equivalent of a vacation romance. Here on the ranch he mostly asks me questions and is happy to see me and willing to follow my suggestions. But once we cross the road to go for The Walk, everything changes.
The entire experience was positive for us both in the sense of every program has to start somewhere. Learning that he doesn’t even think to look at me when we’re out of the comfort zone, much less allow my own calm to ease his mind and calm him, just means a chance to learn more horsemanship skills to deal with them appropriately.
Either that or my own calm was helping and that’s why he never once bolted or reared or jumped into my arms or retreated into a comatose state.
What I need to ask in my next lesson:
- Am I shoving him off cliffs with my approaches to various thresholds or am I respecting the thresholds and helping him gain confidence?
- How much can I allow him to eat of the grasses and plants along the way without making him sick?
- How can I be more effective about enforcing the rule of walking behind me (knowing that Rocky spent 7 years being taught to put the human in Zone 2 before I got him)?
- Is it dangerous to allow Rocky, specifically, to power into fast trot, canter, and gallop on the uneven ground at the school?
- How do I “match his energy” or “match his energy and add four ounces” effectively?
If Erin doesn’t want to go for The Walk, I can probably simulate some of it in the front arena.
Some things I handled pretty well. I can see now when he’s ready to move on after a freeze-in-place-to-stare. I don’t get flustered, frustrated, or scared. I don’t blame Rock at all — it’s all about my learning as quickly as possible how to be the leader he needs out on the trail.
I’m so proud of his progress, too. He’s not afraid of bicycles or barking dogs or moving vehicles or walking over the wooden bridge and through a doorway-sized squeeze to walk down the narrow path between fences to get to the school. He was fascinated by the kids on the trampoline and we watched them for a long while. He didn’t completely panic about the bonfire or the goats, though he was tense. He had enough presence of mind that after staring and snorting at something for a while, he would rudely mug me for cookies.
He understands that mailboxes often, but not always, have horse cookies on top, and therefore must be inspected. He doesn’t panic about stepping on his rope while grazing and exploring the forested hill and open grass field behind the school. He inspected all rocks and stumps at the school in case of cookies.
Most importantly he didn’t fall over when he lost his balance galloping in a circle and he didn’t step in a hole and snap his leg. Nor did he aim any kicking at me — he had to release the energy but didn’t do it in my direction.
When we got back to the lane toward home, he spooked in place twice at the fathers-sons-Labrador football game, then realized they weren’t going to eat him and got absorbed in acorns instead. Even when one dad intercepted a pass and ran all 90 yards to the end zone right next to us — basically sprinting toward Rock the whole time — Rock didn’t even flinch.
I ended with some loose horse time in the arena, just hanging out. He explored every corner and obstacle in case of cookies, and was calm and even affectionate with me. He stood patiently at the pasture gate to be blanketed (and helped by putting his head through the neck hole) even though he could see that the hay had already been distributed and both Riley and Centella were eating.
Jan and Dan will be here for four days in a row this week, and we will try to take all the animals on The Walk at least twice and may even be able to do it daily.
Rock has been galloping around bucking like a yearling during the first few minutes of his turnout with Salsa in the arena, so yesterday I decided to take my Australian saddle out there and see if it fits him and if so, get back to our freestyle patterns. Early last year Jenni and I tried it and it seemed pretty good for him but felt odd for us. Now that I evaluate it with my Parelli-opened eyes, I think it is going to be a good “balance point” saddle.
While he and Salsa concentrated on rolling and investigating all the obstacles for cookies, I dragged every pole out and let it fall some what haphazardly, although generally in a north-to-south direction. I also moved some barrels out and spread the tarp flat. Rock doesn’t know where his feet are and he doesn’t pick them up very high either, so for a while I’m going to try scattering stuff around. Not specifically to play with, but to be there in hopes of teaching him his responsibility #4: look where you are going.
I let him play for a while longer and when he started looking to me for ideas, I suggested that he get on the pedestal with all four feet. Just a soft point with a finger, and a firm picture in my mind of what I wanted. He got right on up and waited for his treat.
He is solid now with getting the front feet up there but still seems to be lifting his back feet and putting them down at random, until they’re on the platform. He will end up with the toe of one hoof barely on the wood or halfway in the crack between two slats of wood. When he gets down, he picks up a front foot and kind of paws it around until it finds the sand, whether that’s in front of him or to one side, and then he leans forward and keeps picking up feet in turn until they are all on the sand. I need to get this on video, because it’s funny, even though it’s kind of sad.
I let him stay there for a while–he really does like it up there!–and then suggested he stick to me. We walked a circuit around the arena, stepping over poles or walking between them. (I didn’t care which route he chose as long as he stuck to me, as the goal here is for him to watch his step, not to jump poles.) When we were lined up with the pedestal, I said “let’s trot!” and we jogged up and put two feet on the platform. He got a treat and we hung out there for a long time, watching the ranch.
We did another circuit in that direction and then one going the other way. I finished up with a zig zag all over the arena, including poles, barrels, and tarps, and ended with all four feet on the pedestal while I sat on the fence near his head.
He was so good through all of this that I decided not to push it with re-introducing freestyle. I really really really really want to ride, but I know that the transition back to saddling might bring up some Issues, and I had the wit to accept the perfect liberty session and end things while he still wanted more. I’m under no illusions, I know right now the treats are 97% of his motivation, but Linda says that “pretty soon” I will learn to be more interesting than the treats if I just follow the program.
I played with Salsa a little bit at liberty, just a few hindquarter and forehand yields, and then I cleaned all four feet. At liberty. He did so well! He still worries about the left hind, so I made sure to say “okay” and put it down quickly, wait, then have him lift it again for one stroke with the pick, then back down. I can tell from his posture that it’s not emotional resistance, it’s a physical soreness or stiffness, and I think that allowing him to set it down and rest from time to time is building trust.
Next on-line session for Salsa will start with figure 8 and introduce the level 2 touch-it! And I need to rake out that round pen so Rocky and I can get moving on the official liberty patterns.
