Trusting a Friend

Painting by Wendy Burden

Sometimes when I describe my horse Mark, I’ll explain that he’s just a plain little horse with a big heart.  Then, I used to add, “He’s cute, but he’s no oil painting.”  Now I can no longer say that because Mark has been painted not once, but twice.  My dear friend Wendy Burden, a very talented artist and the author of the wonderful Dead End Gene Pool,  painted the above portrait of Mark last year and gave it to me as a gift and I told her then that it was one of the nicest gifts anybody has ever given me, which truly, it is.

And, as I mentioned in a recent blog, I recently discovered that a painted portrait of me riding Mark in Steep Rock is hanging in our local bank. It’s part of a small art exhibit by Carol Johnson, who happened upon us in Steep Rock one day, snapped a photo and then painted us.

Painting by Carol Johnson

I’ve written about Mark here on this blog many times, but today I’d like to write about an adventure we had on Wednesday.  It was a rather hectic ride during which Mark revealed his outstanding honesty, willingness and trust, though by the end of the day, I felt undeserving of all of it.  Here’s what happened.

Mark was not ridden all winter and like humans, horses need to be worked back into shape slowly, once they’ve started packing on the pounds.  You can’t just take them off and canter and jump them all over the place after they’ve been lolling about in a field all winter.  So I’ve been doing long slow rides around the neighborhood and we’ve taken a few trips to Steep Rock. I think riding up and down hills at a walk and a slow trot is the best way to condition a horse without causing injuries to their muscles and tendons. It’s much more enjoyable for horse and rider than just riding around in a ring.  They also need to build up their aerobic stamina, so you should take it slow and not let them become winded.

So Mark is slowly getting back into shape.  In the meantime, my friend Candace Bushnell has taken up riding again.  Candace had horses growing up and has just bought a dressage horse and has been riding at a nearby barn.  I watched a few of her lessons with the very lovely and talented trainer, Katja Eilers and I decided I would like to take up dressage again.  It’s actually something I’ve been thinking about for some time and I know of  Katja’s excellent reputation from others who have ridden with her.  So, in recent weeks I’ve been taking lessons on Katja’s beautiful upper level dressage horse, and then coming home and practicing on Mark.   On Wednesday, I was scheduled to have a lesson on another horse of Katja’s – a gorgeous gelding that Katja rode last year in the region’s USDF finals and won the Grand Prix.  So I was very excited to ride this handsome athletic horse and I had a lesson scheduled at 2:00.

The barn is quite close to my house.  It takes me less than ten minutes to drive there, but there are also trails that I’ve ridden for years that run from a road near me, to a place where you can turn off the trail and ride a short, but very steep trail right up to the barn where I was to take the lesson.  Since I’m trying to get Mark fit, I thought I’d multi-task by riding Mark to the barn, putting him in a stall for the lesson, and then riding him home.  I also thought it would be great fun to ride to a destination.

The day before,  Candace and I had hiked this trail and Candace pointed out the spot where you turn off the main trail – an old railroad bed that runs along the river –  to a barely visible trail that leads up to the barn.  This is the only trail to the barn.  The entire hill is covered with jagged rocky ledge and thick groupings of prickly bushes, trees and mountain laurel.  I was very impressed that Candace recognized the turnoff point because it’s not marked and really is barely a trail at all.  She led us up to the barn on foot and I told her  how impressed I was with her guidance, as I have no sense of direction and am constantly getting lost in the woods.

Why I didn’t remember that yesterday when I set off on horseback into those woods alone, I’ll never know.

We left here at 12:15 for a 2:00 lesson.  I expected the ride to take half an hour and I wanted to give us a little extra time because Mark likes to splash around in the river.  We had to take a different route, as the property where we used to cut through in order to cross the Shepaug River has been sold and I don’t know the new people.  So we needed to cross a bridge.  It’s a wide bridge, built for trucks and cars and though we’ve crossed it before, it always worries Mark.  We haven’t crossed it in years and he really balked at the beginning, where there is a wide metal strip that is like a cattle guard in the road, from a horse’s point of view. It’s a sort of grate and you can see through down to the river, far below.  I got off and tried leading him across the grate.

No, it wasn’t safe, according to Mark.

So we remained on the bridge in the heat for about 15 minutes discussing this.  I stood on the metal strip to show him that it was safe, I tempted him with pepperments, I tried backing him over the thing, but he was not budging.  He was very afraid, which he revealed to me by emptying his bowels several times on the bridge, always, just as a car was passing.  It’s important in a situation like this not to put too much pressure on a frightened horse, but also not to give in.  If you give up and turn back, he thinks that he knows better than you about what is safe and that makes him less certain of you.  So I just stood and offered treats and he inched closer and closer and then he leapt over the seam and I gave him lots of treats and praise.  On the other side of the bridge, we entered the cool woods, which made us both happy.

Am I going on too long?   Shall I finish tomorrow?  No, I’ll tell the rest now.

So we rode along the beautiful path that led to the very wide riverside trail, which is an old railroad bed.  We trotted along briskly.  The air along the river was crisp and cool and there was the smell of cedar all around us.  Mark was very forward and eager and we had a nice long trot and then I let him splash around in the river a little.  Then we rode to the place where I thought we were supposed to turn up the trail for Candace’s barn.  But I couldn’t find the trail.  I found what I thought was the trail and we started to climb it, but it ended up not being a trail and after becoming entangled in some prickly shrubs, engulfed in swarms of mosquitoes and cobwebs, we turned back and tried another path that looked like a trail and then another.  Eventually, I saw a ridge that I thought I recognized from my hike with Candace.  We had climbed over this steep rocky promontory on foot and discussed how it couldn’t be passed on horseback, which was a shame, as it led to the barn trail.  I decided that I would dismount and lead Mark over the ridge.  Mark is very sure-footed, I reasoned.  So I jumped off and we started up the ridge.

Mark was now a little tired. We had been going up and down hills and I knew he was relieved when I got off.  As we started up, the footing was very trappy.  It was muddy with lots of big rocks to negotiate and there were holes in the ground in places.  I was able to lead Mark around some tricky areas and we climbed and climbed.  Mark was like a mountain goat.  At times, I would climb up a piece of ledge and when I got out of the way, he actually jumped up onto it after me.  The higher we climbed, the hotter and sticker the air became.  We were both drenched in sweat.  My arm was covered in a red rash that I was certain was poison ivy and because we were pushing our way through lush foliage, I knew that we both had ticks on us.  The tiny ticks that I can’t see without my glasses, but which often carry Lyme and other diseases.

Finally we reached the top, but I had made a mistake.  There was no path.  We stood there a moment to catch our breath.  We were now in a clearing and the air was a little fresher, but all I could see around us were thick woods and other ledges.  It was now 1:30, which is the time I had told Candace to expect me at the barn.  I was afraid that the people at the barn would worry that I was injured but I had no way of calling them because we have no cell-service here.  Why?  Because people like to come up on weekends and not be bothered by their business calls according to one jerk-off I met recently.  Also, people oppose towers because of their unsightliness, their fear of radiation, etc.  I didn’t bring my EMS radio, which was a mistake.  It’s a little bulky but I should have brought it.  I could have radioed to somebody and had them call the barn and say that I was going home.  Because I could find my way home.  The river was at the bottom of the hill and I could just ride it back the way I came.  But now I was closer to the other barn and I wanted to get there to let them know I was safe.

So we climbed down the hill.  On steep, muddy parts, I sent Mark ahead of me because I was still unmounted and didn’t want him to slip and crush me.  At one point he did slip and sort of slid down a muddy embankment on his hocks.  I let go of the reins so that I wouldn’t get pulled over and when he finally reached the bottom, the blessed horse stood and waited for me to catch up.

When we arrived back at the riverbed, I mounted again and Mark started to turn back in the direction of home, but I had to steer him away from home, because I decided to try one more trail.  I knew we were almost at the barn.  Though he suspected I was mistaken, we started off on another uphill deer path and eventually I had to dismount again.  This time, however, when we reached a treacherous incline, Mark stopped.  I urged him to follow.  Mark didn’t think it was safe, and he planted his feet.  This time, I was the one who needed to obey.   He knows more about what a horse can safely navigate than I do, I had to trust him on this.   ”You’re right, I’m wrong,” is a humbling thing to have to admit to a horse, but horses, like all creatures, know they can trust somebody who can admit a a mistake and is willing to listen to other ideas.   So we turned around and headed back for the main trail.

Back at the river trail, he wanted to head for home and I had to steer him  toward the opposite end of the trail where there is a road that eventually leads to the barn where Candace rides. I just wanted them to know I was safe.  Many horses would have balked at this point, after their rider had proven so clearly how unreliable a navigator she is, but Mark obediently turned in the direction I asked and we rode to the end of the trail.  When we arrived at the road, we had to climb it and Mark was exhausted. It was still at least a mile to the barn and I dismounted again and we trudged up the hill.  It was now 3:00.  When we arrived at the barn, Katja was there, very relieved. She was on the phone with Candace, who had driven to my house and when she learned from Denis how long ago I had left, they had called 911!  They did the right thing.  They though I might be lying in the woods with a broken leg or something.

Katja and I called off the troops, then we hosed off Mark and sponged him down with a cooling liniment.  We led him down the barn aisle to a cool stall where I was going to leave him while Candace drove me home to get my rig.  As we walked down the aisle, we passed several handsome show horses including the gleaming chestnut gelding that I had been scheduled to ride and I felt a little pang of guilt.  It’s not as if I was planning to no longer ride Mark and buy a fancy show horse, but the thought had crossed my mind that it might be nice to have Mark and a fancy show horse.  Mark clip-clopped down the aisle, past the horses bred from some of the top stallions in Europe. My Mark, whose dam was a common draft horse, his sire a Morgan, had been born in a field, not a stud farm, born actually on the wrong side of the fence.  And now who could possibly place a value on this earnest, solid citizen, my four-legged hero, my honest, intelligent and ever-forgiving friend?

“If somebody offered me a million dollars for this horse,” I told Katja, “I wouldn’t take it.”

She agreed. He’s priceless.