My Kingdom for a... Scrawny Greenbroke Foxtrotter?!?
>> Sunday, February 20, 2011
Before you read this, I suggest reading Little Abigail and the Beautiful Pony by Shel Silverstein. It may help you imagine how my mother behaved when getting our first pony. (It will also help you imagine how my poor mother felt after I found this poem at age 6 and read it to her almost every time we got in the car..)
However, my dearest dad did not tell her no, so don't worry, she did not die. Though I'm sure in hindsight, the funeral would have been a lot cheaper than what ensued..
From the earliest ages I can remember, I have always been fascinated by ponies. I blame this on my mom, who shared my fascination and became my biggest enabler. Stuffed ponies, plastic ponies, pony books galore. My Friend Flicka, Thunderhead, the Black Stallion.. I had them all, penned in corrals of my imagination and ink.
So at every major holiday, I asked for a pony. Even off holidays, I asked for a pony. Strong wills are as prominent in my family as our Italian noses, and I distinctly remember trying to reason with my mother that getting a pony would not be that expensive. (Which is why you NEVER listen to a six year old on financial matters....)
She tried to soothe my desire with more pony books, but that only added fuel to the fire. "Look at the Dutch Warmblood, mom! Look at the Haflinger! Look at the Thoroughbred!" (Little did I know that a decade later, all three would be right out my back door.)
She tried to fill my empty stalled heart with vast numbers of Breyer horses. I would sit for hours, consulting my trillion pony books to create the truest life I could for my machine-made friends. "This one's an Appaloosa; he'd be a wild Indian horse. This one looks like a quarter horse, so he's going on the ranch. She's a Thoroughbred.."
This even spilled over into my school life. At recess, I would assign breeds and colors to my friends, and we'd spend our time playing a "horse" jumping game.. I even had a sheet of paper designating everyone's name, color, breed, and whether they were wild or not.
I had it Bad. With a capital B.
The only one who had it worse than me was my mom. She'd married my father back in the dinosaur years with the promise that he'd go out and club her a nice pony if she'd move into his cave. She forever reminds me to "get the horse up front".
My mom is a wealth of knowledge.
But despite his promise, we were still horseless. My mom had become an aged cynic, believing she'd never own a horse, and I was just a mildly annoying seven year old who doodled misshapen ponies on anything I could get my hands on.
Until I became unable to make it through the day without Tylenol.
I was playing softball, and after years of being dragged to my brother's games, I was pretty pumped to be on the field. But after every game, I would require tons of pain killers and would be reduced to a limping mess. Soon it boiled over to day to day activities, and before you know it, BAM!
Children's Hospital.
Crying Mom, crying Girl, cheerful decor and all.
Turns out my well-meaning Mom and Pop didn't have the best genetics (proof that responsible breeding is the only way to go), and little Girl had severe hip dysplasia. My doctor was going to have to reconstruct my hip, a process that would include a six-week body cast and massive rehab.
I felt like my life had been ruined and proceeded to be overly melodramatic from that point forward. Considering my way with words, I'm sure my parents were bummed they hadn't created a mute Little instead of a lame Little.
But in one of my crying fits, I sniffled. "Momma, if I make it," Sniff, sniff. Choked sob. "Can I have a pony?" Sniff, sniff, glancing up with watery eyes.
"Of course! You can have whatever you want, sweetie." Cut to crying mother.
That's one thing about major medical issues. Your parents are putty in your hands.
I turned eight, and they manage to dodge the pony thing by sending me to Camp Hell Horse Camp. Little did I know that my dearest momma was using the time to our full advantage and had caught a hard case of horse fever.
After coming to the conclusion we could afford a horse habit (HAHAHAHA), she had decided we were getting a horse and enlisted an aging cowboy (who I'm sure thought we were crazy) to help her. He'd been out to buy a saddle from a guy and, wouldn't ya know? The man had a horse for sale.
My mom thought she knew something about horses, considering she'd ridden bareback throughout the Stone Ages (dodging dinos is supposed to be awesome for your balance!) and had consumed almost every equine literature known to God. So, she loaded up to look at the aforementioned horse, a kind of scrawny four year old foxtrotting gelding. She rode him down the road and back and very logically told the man she would think about it.
Later that night, she called him and offered $900. Well, darned if he didn't have another offer, and more people coming out soon. She thanked him, logically, but stuck to her very reasonable offer for a greenbroke foxtrotter.
After hanging up the phone, she cried until my dad told her to "just buy the damn horse". She called the man back and offered to pay more than the other people, whatever would get her the scrappy pony.
She subscribed to John Lyons' Perfect Horse (...kind of a stretch, if you ask me) and ordered tack off Ebay. A couple weeks later, we picked up Hamlet. We rode every day, taking turns sitting on a bucket. I'd ride, she'd watch. She'd ride, I'd play in the dirt.
We were horsepeople, finally.
I'm not sure if you've realized, but I'm not a foxtrotting, trail riding Girl. How does a kid with a greenbroke pony in the middle of nowhere learn to dance down the centerline? Elementary, my dear readers.
I pestered. I bugged. In the trillion pony books, I owned many "Saddle Club" stories, and I became convinced that Pony Club was real. I begged my mom, who brushed Pony Club off as a fictional thing.
And then we got a local "horsepaper", and right there on the cover: PONY CLUB. Turns out, there was a real-life, honest to God, Pony Club just two hours away.
We bought a trailer to haul Hamlet the scraggly super-pony. (We even let my dad pick out the brand and write the check! Family bonding!) The DC of the Pony Club reminded my mom to not let Hamlet turn away from the trailer. Once we presented him, he had to get on.
It took us two hours to load him the first time.
I'm pretty sure our fellow Pony Clubbers didn't have much faith in our survival as horse people at first. We came in our truck that didn't have air conditioning going up hills and with our bridle put together wrong. Our pony had his mane cut by hand. Our Ebayed endurance saddle didn't fit either of us or Hamlet.
(I preferred bareback, but my mom would pay me a quarter a ride just to get me in the saddle.)
We had the hunger though. We both devoured any knowledge offered, and we both can still whoop some butt when it comes to horse management knowledge.
Twice a month, sometimes more, she'd load Hamlet and I up and drag us two hours for lessons or Pony Club activities. We found Dressage lessons with the Boss Mare when I was nine. We found Cow shortly after. We upgraded saddles, trucks, horses. It's been a constant push to evolve, to learn more.
It's now a decade later, and we are still learning. I've spend thousands of hours in the car, thousands more in the saddle. I've done flying lead changes; I've done flying dismounts (unplanned ejections is more like it). I've consumed ungodly amounts of horse hair.
Thank you, Mom, for making this happen and for watching every single one of my lessons.
Thank you, Dad, for footing the bill and feeding the horses with minimal cussing.
Without you guys, I probably would have ended up dying from normal causes instead of asphyxiation by horse hair.
How boring.
-- Girl
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