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In the past few weeks, more than one person has asked me to write about my partnership with Henry. Either more details about how we overcame challenges that we faced along the way, or my thoughts as to how our partnership got to be the way that it is, or how it’s possible that I always seem to be so annoyingly pleased with my horses. Which… I have to say, I don’t think I’m an anomaly in that. There are a lot of examples of great horse and rider partnerships in the blog world.

And, to be totally honest, I feel kind of uncomfortable writing anything remotely similar to a how-to or giving very specific, detailed advice. It feels a little (a lot) douchey. Everyone’s situation is so unique, and I certainly do not have all the answers nor do I want to sit here and pretend like I do. I’m not a professional. I have plenty of issues, just like anyone else, and so do my horses. I also think that a big part of why my partnership with Henry has been such an overall happy one is because I’m one of the luckiest people on earth and blindly stumbled upon one of the most genuine, honest horses that I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing. That’s not skill, or savvy… that’s luck.

But it’s also true that the horse I stumbled across on facebook for $900 was a bit different from the horse I have now. It took a while to overcome some of his demons and make him happier and more confident in his work. He’s always been golden at his core, he just needed someone to show him how to take a deep breath. I was fortunate enough to have learned some valuable lessons from horses that came before him, and I was in the right place at the right time in my own education to be what he needed me to be in the beginning. I still made mistakes of course, plenty of them, STILL DO, ALL THE TIME, but things slowly started to click and come together for us.

Since then I’ve been even more fortunate to have my perspective evolve tremendously just by having the relationship that I do with Henry, and I’ve noticed that I’ve already carried the things that I’ve learned over to Presto. I spent my pre-Henry years buying cheap horses, training them up a bit, and then selling them, so I’ve owned more than my fair share. They all taught me something, but none of them have really brought everything into focus as much as Henry has. He’s been an incredible source of clarity for me – as a rider, as a horseman, and as a human being.

So I will (hesitantly) put pen to paper on this one, so to speak, and share the things that have really been cemented in my mind over the past several years with Henry, and from seeing the relationships that some of my friends have with their horses. I can sit here and tell you a thousand different stories, but in they end they all kind of boil down to just a few basic ideas, so I went with that instead. I’m hoping that, if nothing else, I’ll be able to look back on this post when I’m having struggles with Presto, or when it’s time to shop for the next horse, and be able to remind myself of what’s important. For me personally, all of these things have been really vital to building a good relationship with a horse. Future self, pull up a seat.

Be honest with yourself

I think that if you’re going to be successful, as a rider or a horseman or anything really, it’s important to be honest with yourself about what you really need and what your abilities truly are. This takes a lot of self-awareness. But you see it ALL the time, people struggling through a bad relationship with a horse that just is not suited to them at all, for whatever particular reason. Unless you’re a pro, it’s not about what you can do (this isn’t a contest), it’s about what you want to do and what will make you the happiest. Do you actually need the fanciest, prettiest horse you can find? Do you really want a green horse? For me, I can do green, but even if I had the money, I’m never gonna go out and buy some big fancy upper level horse that requires a strong accurate ride and spends half of it’s free time being an idiot. I’m just not interested. Doesn’t suit my lifestyle or my preference or my skill level. So before you buy the horse: What do you really want? What are you really capable of? What type of horse will fit best into your personal situation? Be brutally honest in your self-assessment.

Which leads us to:

Buy the right horse.

For some people the right horse could be something straight off the track, whereas for someone else the right horse might be a 15yo been there done that QH that is rock solid and steady. There’s nothing wrong with either extreme, or anything in the middle. Young or green horses need consistency, they need confidence, they require a lot of time and energy, and they need to be properly educated… if you can’t realistically (or don’t want to) provide those things, get a horse that already has them. If there’s a certain brain or personality you really need or want, keep looking until you find it. And if you own a horse that isn’t right for you, or you don’t enjoy riding it, sell it. There’s some kind of weird stigma in the horse world that selling a horse equals “giving up” on it. This is insane. Most of the time both the horse and the rider are going to be much happier with a different partner or in a different career, and sometimes it’s just time to move on. Give yourself permission to do right by both of you, part ways, and find the horse you enjoy that fits your needs. It doesn’t really matter what anyone else thinks.

Have realistic expectations

Honestly, just from my own personal observations, unrealistic expectations seem to be one of the major things that lead to people being really unhappy with their horses. They’re big prey animals with tiny brains, they are gonna be dumb sometimes. Some a lot dumber than others. You also can’t realistically expect a green horse to make up for your mistakes, or be perfect, or consistent. If you need a horse to do that, buy something that’s already made. Even then, it’s still a horse, not a robot. It’s important to always make your expectations clear and always be in pursuit of progress, but it’s also important to understand that they will not always be met. Shrug it off, reassess, and try again tomorrow.

Set yourself and your horse up for success

You see this all the time too, when someone makes a bad decision and you can already see the writing on the wall before it happens. There ends up being an accident, or the whole situation begins to quickly unravel. We’re human, we will inevitably make bad decisions sometimes. That’s part of it. But on the flip side, a lot of problems can be avoided if you take the time to stop, think, and then continue on. What I’m asking – is it fair? Is the horse prepared – mentally and physically? Have I done the homework? I try not to put any of us into situations where we’re unlikely to succeed – it’s so vital to keep the trust and the confidence up.

It’s not personal

Ah, man. Another thing you see this all the time: someone saying their horse was “an asshole” or that their horse did this thing to them or that thing to them. Horses aren’t malicious, they’re reactive. They don’t wake up in the morning scheming about how to make us angry or make us look stupid. Every time I feel myself getting frustrated, I try to take the emotional element out of it and think about things from the horse’s perspective. Is he confused? Is he tired? Is he hurting? Is he lacking confidence? Am I doing something wrong? Henry especially has demanded this from me, and he still does. He is a very honest horse, but if he feels like you’re doing wrong by him, he will absolutely let you know. Not in a mean way, but in a “I’m done participating until you get your shit together” way. I appreciate that about him, because he’s made me a better horseman. Still working on the “better rider” part…

Make peace with the things you can’t change

There are so many things you can improve about a horse. His training, his gaits, his strength, on and on and on. But there are some things you can’t really fix, or some things that just won’t change a whole lot. I love Henry dearly, but I feel pretty sure that he will never be a particularly spectacular dressage horse. His natural default mode is tense, his natural gaits are meh, and his natural balance is downhill. There has been massive improvement – he is obedient and he is much more capable – but he will likely never be the dressage winner. I accept that. He also won’t ever be a particularly careful showjumper. He has the ability, but he’s a minimalist and just isn’t that bothered by touching a rail. I accept that too. He’s got crooked front legs, so I’m really careful about his shoeing schedule, the footing he works in, and his conditioning. These are facts, and I accept all of them. He makes up for it in a million other ways, so they just are what they are. No horse is perfect. If I couldn’t live with his faults, I would have sold him years ago. We’ll never stop working to improve the negative things, but I’m realistic about it, I accept it, and I’m not holding any of it against him. Don’t hold grudges against a horse just for being who he is.

Everyone needs help sometimes

Pride and ego are the enemies to a good partnership. There will always be bumps in the road, things you need help with, situations that you aren’t sure how to handle. No one knows everything, and there is zero shame in bringing in a professional to help. To me it’s shameful to let a situation go on for too long, or to keep fumbling through something that isn’t working – almost always to the horse’s detriment. Don’t be your own worst enemy. Know when to hand the reins to someone else.

Patience is everything

It’s true, Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither was a solid horse and rider team. It takes time to build up the trust required – lots and lots of deposits into the trust bank. And being patient with yourself is just as important as being patient with the horse. To me this is one of the hardest parts. Especially not getting caught up in comparing yourself to other people, their horses, their progress, but just being patient and letting everything fall into place in it’s own due time. That’s so hard, but so critical.

Otherwise I mostly just try to remember to also keep it fun. It doesn’t always have to be work work work all the time. We goof off, we play around, we take days to just go exploring or for a bareback hack. It helps keep me grounded and remembering why I do this, and to be honest, I think those “fun” days have done more to strengthen the bond than all of the work days put together. We trust each other and have a pretty good level of understanding. Some days I just mentally can’t, and some days he just mentally can’t. So on those days, we just don’t. And that’s okay.

Henry isn’t perfect, and there are a lot of things he will never be, just like there are a lot of things I’ll probably never be either. But I appreciate all the good things about him, we mesh well together, and in a lot of ways he’s completely irreplaceable to me. I’m so appreciative to have this type of relationship with Henry right now, while I’m “raising” Presto. I can easily draw comparisons as I try to mold my and Presto’s relationship to mimic the one I have with Henry. It makes me think a little more holistically about how we got there, what I did right, and what I did wrong. There is plenty of both.

Back in the days when I actively watched my blog stats and made a real effort, I always looked through the “search terms” on a fairly regular basis. I was curious about all the different ways that people found my site – what they had searched for that somehow ultimately led them here. One time, a few years ago, I did a post with all the funniest search terms I had noticed. These days I don’t really actively look at that stuff very much anymore, but sometimes as I’m scrolling past, things catch my eye. One thing in particular got my attention the other day, which led me to looking through the search terms from 2018 so far. Oh my. There are some doozies. I thought they warranted a resurrection of the Best Search Terms post.

The vast majority of them are what you’d expect – people googling the blog name, people looking for coupon codes, people wondering how to dye a saddle, or looking for specific product reviews. But sometimes you come across one that just really makes you raise your eyebrow for whatever reason. I picked my top 10 favorites out of those, set them in some awesome quote poster backgrounds, and here we are now.

Like this one… I’m trying to imagine the person who typed this into their search bar. Is this a big problem in relationships? What did they decide to do? Did her logos get any better? I need closure on this.

I mean… I’m pretty sure I don’t do this very often, but… there there, here’s a kleenex.

Can’t really argue with that one, though. Accurate-apotamus.

Did this person ask google to google this for him/her? And chew toys? Is that a thing?

99.9% sure I don’t want to know the motives behind this one, or why it led them to me.

Man, I really feel for the person who searched for this. Aren’t we ALL searching for answers like these? Will we ever find them? #deepthoughts

NO, INTERNET, NO! DO NOT DO THIS. NO.

EQUALLY HORRIFYING, DO NOT DO THIS EITHER.

I’m… not really sure what to think of this one. I mean, I do have horses, so…

And last but certainly not least, my personal favorite:

I dunno kid, but if you found out please come back and let the rest of us know.

It’s almost mid-May, which means spring is pretty much over in Texas. Once we get past tomorrow, the entire 10 day forecast has temps in the low to mid 90’s. Welcome to summer. Around here, that means sweaty horses and stagnant air. Which in turn means that the fly and gnat population, which has really just been moderate thus far, is about to explode.

I buy fly spray by the gallon, pretty much all year long. I’m almost all the way through the first gallon that I bought a couple months ago, so I ordered more yesterday. I also realized it was probably time to replace Henry’s 4 year old fly mask, which was starting to get really worn and kinda pokey at the eyes, so he got a new one a couple weeks ago. Presto didn’t have a fly mask either, but I had bought one for him in my last Riding Warehouse order, guessing at his size.

For Henry I got the Rambo Plus fly mask, which I’m fairly certain might last him for the rest of his life. He’s turned out alone, so he’s pretty easy on his fly masks, and this thing is rugged. His old one was your cheap basic Cashel, which I thought worked fine for him. It always sat a little too close to his eyes for my taste though, especially when he’d rub his head (he is Mr. Allergies this time of year). So I opted this time for a design that holds the mask out well away from the eyes. It’s a good design idea, and it works. But he kinda looks like a walking spaceship.

When I first put it on we all laughed and laughed and laughed at him. He looks absolutely ridiculous. The mask is so big. It definitely gets the job done though, the fabric sits several inches clear of his eyes. Starting this weekend he’ll be wearing it pretty much all the time, so I’ll review the Spaceship Mask at some point.

Presto is still growing super fast and his eyes don’t really jut out from his head quite like Henry’s do, so I opted to take the cheap route and bought him a Cashel. I had good luck with how long Henry’s had lasted, so I stuck with what I knew. Looking at their size options I figured surely the 15h baby warmblood would fit fine in the arab/cob size. I mean, that seems pretty typical. His dam wore cob size stuff as a yearling and 2yo. His leather halter is a cob (okay granted, it’s on it’s very tightest holes). His rope halter is arab sized, which actually fits him pretty perfectly with it’s smaller nose. He outgrew his “yearling” size rope halter at like 9 months old because of how long his head is.

But what I didn’t really take into account is just how narrow his head is and how little his jaw is. His head is long, sure, but it’s narrow. You can’t really tell from this angle, but the mask is huge around his jaw. It’s not even possible to make the velcro tight enough to where it’s anywhere near snug. I’m pretty sure that if he just shook his head, the whole thing would go flying. Not gonna work this year.

So yesterday as I was throwing fly spray and dewormer and salt blocks into my Riding Warehouse cart, I perused the flymasks and found that the Noble Outfitters small equates to yearling/large pony size and it was on sale. His head is just so much more TB-like than his dam’s was. I kind of forgot. He might be tall, but his head is comparatively little. So I tossed the teeny tiny Guardsman mask in the cart, and hopefully that’ll work. The design of it is sorta similar to the Rambo, just not nearly as extreme with how far out it stands away from the eyes.

So now tiny-headed Presto has his own mini-spaceship mask coming. Can’t wait to see the look he gives me when I put that thing on him. I hope they understand that I do this out of love, not just to make them look hilariously dumb. That part is a bonus.

Last week my fly wipes arrived from EnviroEquine and I have to say, I think they’re working REALLY well so far. I’ve been wiping ears/faces/noses/legs with those and have definitely noticed way fewer flies on both boys. They’re especially great for Henry when we ride out in the fields – the head shaking is pretty much gone. The smell is a little funny, but as long as they work like this, I can live with it.

Headed into summer I have one more “care” issue I need to tackle – protecting Presto’s little white nose. He’ll only come inside during the heat of the day in the afternoon, so I’ll need to put something on his nose to keep it from getting sunburned the rest of the day. People with white nosed horses that live on the surface of the sun – what’s your favorite product for sun protection?

A few months ago when I was planning Presto’s move and subsequent, uh, life… I tentatively highlighted a couple of Future Event Horse shows that I might consider taking him to. Caveat being, since he’s a yearling, it would depend on how he looked at that particular moment in time. He’s a leggy, rangey, kinda scrawny looking type of guy. His large percentage of thoroughbred blood is obvious. While I personally think that’ll make him end up being a pretty great event horse type, right now it makes him look a bit like a baby giraffe. Sometimes llama.

While most of the judges at FEH are able to see through stuff like that, it certainly doesn’t put him at his best for the whole in-hand showing thing when he’s in the middle of a particularly giraffey growth spurt. A couple weeks ago he actually was looking like the May 20th show might be possible. He’d filled out a lot, his neck was looking pretty normal, and he almost had a butt. Then, seemingly overnight, he grew another inch and everything went back to mega giraffe mode. Like… he’s cute from only a few very specific angles, and only if he stands very still. I love him, but it’s true. He’s hardcore in the teenage awkwards.

So, the May 20th FEH show is a no-go. I just have a hard time wanting to send in the entry and spend a couple hundred dollars when he’s not in a particularly attractive stage of growth. I thought about just saying screw it and taking him anyway, for the experience, but… it’s a long drive and a lot of money to spend for experience.

There’s another little show here in town this coming weekend at the place where I sometimes take Henry for laid back Combined Tests. It’s cheap, it’s a lot closer, and it still has plenty of hustle and bustle and LOTS to look at. More than the other show, honestly. They also offer one in hand class – “in hand trail”. Presto is definitely not a trail horse. I have never done a trail class in my life. I’m not even totally sure that I know what it is. I mean, Henry and I have wandered over to their trail course a couple times so he could snort at all the pool noodles (there are so many pool noodles) but that’s the extent of my education.

Naturally, I cackled wildly and signed Presto up for in hand trail.

I mean, worst case scenario he won’t go near any of it and we “wasted” our $15. But they let you come school the course beforehand, so we’ll have a little time to snort and freak out at all the weirdness before I have to try to actually get him through the whole thing. I’ll be honest, if I can get him through it all, I’ll be shocked. It’ll be good for him, though.

Last week I did set up a couple of little things with poles in our arena… a square that he had to pivot in, an L shape that he had to back through, and two barrels set about 4′ apart that I “sent” him through back and forth by himself. He understood all of it pretty much immediately, then a few horses neighed in the barn and he forgot his place in the world for a moment. A few corrections later, he remembered.

So I have no idea how any of this will go, but at the very least it will be good for him to get in the trailer and go somewhere alone, get to see the commotion of a show, and be expected to “perform” and pay attention in the midst of it all. It might be a long day for all of us. There will be a lot of those in the next 4 years.

As an aside, I texted the farrier yesterday to ask how Presto was for his trim and he said “Perfect! He gets a gold star.”. Majorly proud mom moment right there. He was not so good before and I’ve been working with him a lot, because I can’t friggin stand it when horses have bad farrier manners. He’s gotten to where he’s really good for me now, but you never know whether those manners will translate in the real world. Very glad he wasn’t a monkey (and so was the farrier)!

This past Saturday was the SO’s birthday. It was also the really cool charity eventing derby that was highlighted, capitalized, and underlined on my calendar. Plus Badminton and the KY Derby. Like, really, not a good time for a birthday, man. But I had been working on this really exceptional plan for over a month now, one that would allow me to go to the eventing derby and still not look like the world’s worst girlfriend. I admit, I generally AM pretty much the world’s worst girlfriend, but I always try to do well on birthdays to help make up for the other 364 days when I suck.

My plan was great. It was plotted pretty much down the half hour, and would work out perfectly to where I could go to the eventing derby and still not lose any face. The SO’s friends were going to take him to this punk festival thing during the day on Saturday, I was going to do the derby, and then we were going to meet up for dinner and drinks afterwards. Sunday and Monday I had planned a whole mini-vacation for us together. It was gonna work out totally fine.

And then the punk festival got cancelled.

And then on Friday morning one of the guys that works with me said “Don’t forget I’m out on Monday”. My head whipped around and I said “No you’re not, I’m out on Monday.”. There are only 3 of us in our department, it’s a big problem for more than one of us to be out at a time. Like… to be avoided except in cases of extreme emergency.

Turns out that he submitted his PTO request online, but never wrote it on our big “department” calendar that we all use to see everyone else’s days off. So when I went to check the calendar before I submitted my online request, it showed no one else being off. Our boss didn’t catch that we’d both submitted PTO for that day. Well SHIT. I am technically the lead, so… I let the other guy have Monday.

That meant that I had to scratch the derby and rearrange all of our Sunday/Monday plans over to Saturday/Sunday. I was not a happy person. I was also a very stressed-out person, especially when I couldn’t move my camping reservation at the state park because there were no available spots for Saturday. After a lot of frantic googling I was able to book us a spot elsewhere, and got everything else moved too. I was really really sad sending that email about having to scratch the derby though.

Saturday we loaded up and headed out toward Glen Rose, about 2 1/2 hours north of us. We stopped along the way in a small town for breakfast, where I tried to really discreetly watch the Badminton XC feed on my phone (because see above about bad girlfriend).

I didn’t feel that bad, he spent the whole time replying to facebook “happy birthday” messages on his phone. Then we finished our drive up to Glen Rose and hit Dinosaur Valley State Park, did some hiking, and looked at the dinosaur tracks in the river bed.

After that it was over to a brewery. I hate beer and hate breweries even more, but the SO is a mega beer nerd, so I just sat there and people-watched (OKAY FINE I WATCHED BADMINTON REPLAYS) while he drank beer.

Then we went to dinner (where I might have also watched the live stream of the KY Derby in a slightly too-loud way. Look, this is the best I can do. This tiger can’t change her stripes.), followed by a trip to the local soda fountain for a malt.

That night we camped in a little RV park I found online. The SO is the one who bought the trunk tent for me in the first place, yet he had never stayed in it. He said he liked it, but I’m 99.9% sure he’s totally lying and would prefer to never stay in it again. He didn’t listen to me about which clothes to bring and ended up freezing his butt off overnight. He’s definitely more of the AirBnB type than the truck tent type. You know what I mean.

Sunday morning after breakfast we went to Dinosaur World, a little park nearby that has bigass dinosaur statues, fossils, and a little museum. Apparently people don’t come there much without kids, because the ticket guy was pretty sure that we were in the wrong place. Can’t a gal just like dinosaurs?

After that we headed home, with a quick stop at a Tractor Supply along the way to get treats for Henry and alfalfa pellets for Presto. We were home early enough that I had time to go fit in another ponying session with the boys while it was still daylight. And there were enough puddles leftover from Friday’s rain to where we were able to drag Presto through some of them. Sorry not sorry, baby event horse.

Today the boys get pedicures (because yeah sure, why not go ahead and write the farrier a fat check just days after writing my first double board check – who needs money?) so we’ll find out how Presto is for the farrier. He’s had trims before, with mixed success, but I’ve been working with him a lot since he got here, so I’m hoping he’s polite. Or at least not a total hellion.

Still really really sad to have missed the show this past weekend, especially because it feels like I haven’t seen anyone in forever, but there are a few more things on the docket in the next month before everything comes to a grinding halt for the summer. Hopefully none of those plans get hijacked too.