Another Journey Begins - Some Grooming............

Part One

At this point in time my situation with the horses was feeling pretty overwhelming. With some of the life things that happened a goodly amount of time had passed with my focus pushed to other things besides training horses. Because of that I ended up with a number of young horses that were not started that needed to be AND really more horses than I had planned on having in the first place.

My big fall from Reflection made it so I didn't really feel safe anymore trying to start these youngsters myself. Also I no longer felt comfortable asking MD for assistance with things between her, my GD and me in a shambles so I was caught between a rock and a hard place. On one hand there was my fear and on the other there was no longer the help I'd relied on when I started young horses. In the middle were all of these horses needing to get started and me without the confidence or resources to get things done.

In addition Dave was losing his job soon and I had all these horses to feed. How were we going to manage all of this? I needed to get some horses gone to get our expenses down. To do that, I really needed to get way more horses worked than I was getting done. I was under a lot of pressure to get something figured out.

Adding to the pressure I knew that I needed horses broke to ride to get them marketed. That's just the way it is these days. I didn't have the money to hire help and there was no way I could get it all done myself even if I didn't have the fear. I was definitely in a vulnerable position and the darkness seemed to be closing in.

Being able to ride horses at this facility seemed like an answer to one prayer anyway. At least I didn't have to worry about not being able to ride due to normal weather conditions. If I could get Storm ready for the ring and sold the coming show season I thought I'd be out of the woods for sure.

Once I began riding over there were other things that began to happen with BG. I suddenly was being treated like I was this great friend in a friendship that hadn't really been all "that" friendly before now. There were offers to go out to lunch and go look at horses and other social things. My phone calls to BG were always answered even though I knew he screened all his calls and let most of them go to voicemail. If he did miss my call, I got an almost immediate reply. I was even encouraged to join BG at the gym. There was that underlying message our friendship was special.

I'd been thinking about doing the gym for a while to get my core strength built back up so I could better deal with situations like unexpected jumps from young horses like Reflection had done. I hadn't gone because I felt over my head and knew I couldn't afford a trainer. I couldn't see the point of paying a membership that I probably wouldn't use.

BG assured me he and his friend (another woman from the barn) went every morning and that I could join them. They'd be glad to show me the ropes. Not long after this offer I Took the Plunge

Then there was the fact right from the start of riding horses at their arena, I was told how wonderful my horses were and how much BG and WF believed in me and in my dream. I was also told lots of things that other people were supposedly saying about me and my horses. Statements like, "I don't care what they say about you MiKael Caillier, I like you." and "Maybe they think your horses are old fashioned but I think they're beautiful and talented" made by BG were common place. I was assured that WF was on the same page in support of me and my breeding program.

I can remember the uneasiness I felt at the remarks supposedly said by others in the industry as well as those I was being told were said by MD and GD. Sometimes I was just plain mad when I left that facility. I found myself thinking I was fighting even a bigger battle to get recognition for my breeding program than I'd previously believed and that things between MD and GD were downright hopeless. This made me feel all the more desperate and vulnerable. I was beginning to feel like I was alone and fighting a losing battle on all fronts. There was no way my dream was going to survive this unless I got some help.

There was something else that BD kept doing maybe even before we got started working horses. I heard from him over and over about WF's connections in the industry and his too. The implication was that they had power and respect that I did not have, she in the Arabian industry and he in the horse industry at large. With that power came the ability to sell horses. It was implied that sticking with them would get the job done for me that I had been unable to get done on my own.

Throughout this time, I was assured BG and WF were in my corner. They'd do what ever they could to help me because they believed in my dream too. I began to think the only friends I had were these two people and that I really needed them or my dream was sunk.

You hear something often enough and you tend to believe it. I found myself buying into the belief that BG and WF had some kind of power in the industry that I didn't have. I began to believe friends I'd had for years were not really friends at all. I began to believe that I needed BG and WF.


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

Offers.......Me and BG

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