Written by me through tears and emotion ... but I did it.
Straight out of high school, my horse and I moved to Kemptville College of Agriculture for their Equine Studies course--me in the dorm, she in the barn. I now have so much more gratitude towards my parents for financing this dream that I'm sure they knew at the time, was basically an exercise in vain. Did they know it would be a major building block in my awareness that would send me seeking other career paths? Perhaps.
The course began in late October and by April both I and my horse Mia were ready to run far far away. Sadly, Mia would not have been able to run very far or fast because the many hours inside her stall --versus living her previous four years outside with enclosed shelter choice--gave her a lung infection. In addition, it was discovered in late November that much of the hay inside the barn was moldy. She was being given ventilation treatments and antibiotic shots in her neck by the time we dropped out--shots I had to continue giving her for a week or so after we got back home. For the cost of the course, my boarding and her boarding, I learned many very important lessons--these two first and foremost:
I didn't love other peoples' horses the way I loved my own and, the hay you feed your horse matters. Do not risk feeding moldy hay--and spraying water on it before feeding--which we were instructed to do --doesn't mitigate the risk if at all.
In that barn of about 20 horses, there existed all kinds. My own four year old mare, trained thus far by myself, breeding unknown, monetary cost minimal was in a stall next to other horses trained by someone other than the student riding them, bloodlines and breeding known, cost exorbitant at least in my mind at that time. One young student was cute as a button and rode the biggest horse in the barn. When she began riding him it was she who was trained how to drive this machine. She and her horse had custom made everything.
In the stalls around, every level of training, ownership, and basic horsey knowledge existed. One very quiet and sweet mare named Angie will always come to mind when I hear the Rolling Stone's song because her owner used to sing it to her in the stall.
The horses and their riders were grouped up based on skill level. Mia and I were in the bottom group and my rural raised mare wasn't too keen on riding inside that echoing arena! But she slowly got used to it and actually began becoming engaged with the boring classes heavy on standing still --something Mia wasn't good at. In fact, she was a speed backer-upper and did so often while other horses stood still. At least she broke the tension and got a laugh out of everyone.
The lessons were aplenty let me tell you. In the classes and the riding alone, I slowly realized that most of my fellow students would not be able to ride or control a horse aside from their own. The cute as a button student wouldn't last a ring around the arena on Mia. In my mind at that time, the number of falls I'd taken were like notches on a belt. I kept these notches few by holding on for dear life. But now, alternatively I think the more falls you've taken illustrates the amount of experience you have.
I kept in touch with a few of the students who finished the course. One friend went on to do a stint at a well-known Equine show jumping facility/farm in Perth. I think this may have taught her even more relevant information about the field she'd just been schooled in. Through long hours, very poor working conditions, and almost daily contact with dozens of badly behaved horses she learned that perhaps she too didn't love all horses the way she loved Autumn, her own horse. But her Gramma kept telling her she was lucky to work for such a prized name in the field of jumping. By the by, she now owns her own aesthetics and hair dressing business and owns horses on the side.
She told me about some things this well known Equestrian athlete told a group of them one day. There was a young n' ornery ego-filled pony colt they were trying to train. He said they gelded him and then worked him the very next day to show him who's boss. Then he chuckled.
She also told me a trick this same athlete said he often used before jumping matches. He would set the warm up jumps in such a way that the horse would hit its hooves on the jump. He found this was an effective pre-match correction that reminded the horse to lift its legs up higher.
Unethical training practices aside, I think of this often when I mess up or worry I've messed up. This anecdote is the whole reason I started writing this post. Rather than stewing and auditing whatever "incorrect thing" I feel I've done, I remember the purpose of this training trick showing me what not to do in the future. It's a course-correction point I can feel and see. And then I can let go having learned that lesson ... again and again and again.
At this point in writing this post, I've held tears back, let them flow, and used a few tissues. In this moment I want to convey just how therapeutic this was for me. You see, in my past I've taken a lot of courses and never really worked in any of those fields for very long if at all. At the time that I was dropping out of Kemptville college Equine studies and taking my horse home with me, my reasoning was that I just didn't feel it anymore. I was homesick and my horse was sick. I'd learned the lessons and saw what the industry could be--shown through a school course meant to promote educated employment in the field.
Now however, I see the many layers to why I no longer felt it anymore. My bubble was burst! I had romanticized shoveling shit and grooming other peoples' horses to such an extent that I honestly thought I wanted to work in that field. Looking back and seeing all of these reasons validates the decision I made 33 years ago to drop out.
Writing this has shown me for the first time how poorly run that program was and yet, how common and real-world those problems are. Hours upon hours of time that we should have been learning ways to manage our horses and their health were spent doing things our tuition should have covered. I remember volunteering to climb through bails of hay with the directive to open one in each area, stick my nose in, and sniff. If it tickled my nose and smelled moldy I was told to pull it. In addition, feeding time was increased from about 2 hours three times a day to much more because we had to fill wheel barrows with hay and roll them into the shower pen in the arena. We were told the water would assist in washing off mold spores. I now know this action likely revived more spores than were washed away causing lung issues in the horses that hay was fed to--mine. My perfectly healthy four year old mare who never had a sick-day in her life thus far, was now getting treatments. And, I have to share that when we got home and I had to give her the antibiotic shots in her neck, she would sway as though she were going to faint. Mia the tuffy was actually Mia the big baby when it was just the two of us.
Lastly, I honestly think that part of me realized that I was trying to fit into a group of people I did not fit in with. Every other student had had riding lessons of some kind. Where I was hoping to get a job with an ethical horse farm, most of my fellow students were hoping to become instructors and to own or manage boarding farms that give lessons. That was the last thing on my mind or in my skill level as illustrated in the way that I trained Mia. At times, it was like she had a totally different operating system than the other 'professionally trained' horses. In our basic level riding group, we learned a different operating system that I used while riding Mia up till the day I gifted her and her offspring to a lucky young lady that had land, time, and a huge passion for horses. I knew Mia would give her lessons she would never learn elsewhere.
Through tears I see the therapy of seeing it, feeling it, and letting it go. Realizing the reasons for my past actions absolutely obliterates any remaining guilt or shame I felt or absorbed from others around me. I let all of that go.
To myself and to Mia who didn't have any vote in whether or not she went to school with me:
I'm sorry
Please forgive me
Thank you
I love you
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