Aidol's Story................He Might Be Country but I'm Definitely Marx

Part 1

One thing I didn't count on when waiting until the last minute to ride in this flat seat saddle was how slick my "new to me" saddle seat suit might be. It wasn't until I got my hinney in the saddle heading up for the ring that I realized that saddle felt slicker than snot.

My horse could feel my trepidation and getting him to move out wasn't easy but I did get it done while in the warm-up arena. It was heading on into the show ring that proved to be the challenge. Aidol was convinced that my worry had to do with something other than this new odd feeling saddle.

The horse sucked back bigtime. The amount of impulsion I had was more like a kid in a walk trot class who hasn't quite convinced his seasoned show horse that he is ready for this new challenge. My forward moving horse had lost pretty much everything having to do with forward. I tried pushing him with my posting but my bottom seemed to slide across the seat instead of driving down into it. I don't think I ever did get the true beautiful trot from the horse that I'd been getting at home.

At least this lack of trot gave me something to focus on besides the squirrelly feel of my pants against the saddle even though I remember clearly thinking I needed some kind of sticky to get a grip.

The whole time I was in that darn class I felt mortified! Mortiried my horse wasn't doing his job.........and even more mortified at my appearance.

What was wrong with my appearance you might ask. Well, that hat I ordered I had checked for size but I hadn't really checked to see how it looked. With my short (then) curly head of hair, the size of my head and the length of the hat's brim (or maybe lack of length might be a better description) I'd caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror getting ready for the class and realized I looked like I was impersonating Harpo Marx instead of trying to show a country pleasure horse.

There was no time to fix the hat and I really wanted to see how Aidol would look next to the other country horses so I'd ignored all instincts about my appearance and ridden that class anyway. Each stride reenforced it had been a mistake.

I guess the good thing is I did make it around the arena. I didn't fall off and I didn't break gait or do the wrong gait or even get a wrong lead. I've always said a ride is good if you get through it going the same direction as everyone else. I managed that just fine. It was just really obvious to me that country pleasure is probably NOT my thing.

The USEF steward at this horse show had spent a lot of time with trotting horses. She thought that Aidol was cute and showed lots of potential..........but me, I wasn't impressed. I returned the saddle and pretty much gave up on the idea of showing Aidol in country pleasure. The next time I rode the horse it was back on the trails.

To be continued....................

A Little about Games



Visit Blog Village and vote daily for this blog Here They are now measuring the rankings by the number of votes out, so if you find my blog on the site, please click that link too to improve my rankings. TY