I was a little engrossed in my work today when Brian got home, and when I get engrossed it can be hard for me to switch gears. It was a beautiful day, and I worked for twelve hours straight yesterday. I knew I could benefit from a break. Still, it took a little bit of coaxing on Brian’s part to pry me from my laptop.
All the way to the barn, my mind dwelled on work. I have two huge/important sites launching within days of each other right now, and at such times I can get a little over-focused. But as always, I stepped into the pasture and all thoughts of work and real life left my mind.
I had one of those rides that is hard to put into words. Steen was soft, attentive, energetic (ok and a little fat too). We worked on all the basics and pretty much nailed everything. Then I threw in some large figure-eights at the lope with a simple lead change in the middle. This is something I work on intermittently, but not with much consistency. Today you’d have thought we’d been drilling on it for months. We hit every one. We were side-passing, leg-yielding, moving forward and back without breaking collection. At one point I got him to do a forward and backwards ladder and he did the whole thing without once putting so much as an ounce of pressure on the hackamore.
Today also happens to be the one year anniversary of our first Buck clinic in Decorah. And I have to say, the horse I have today doesn’t even resemble the one I was riding then. I feel like more than anything Buck gave me a language. I’m still working on my accent, but my horses are understanding me.
Brian also had a fantastic ride on Laredo. I got back in the car wondering how I could have even considered not going for a ride today.
Ride Time: 1:10
Horseback hours YTD: 112:00