Memory Lane

Jill had found a shared accomodation arrangement just before she started 1st year at the U of Moo, and she had never moved out.  If it ain't broke, don't fix it, right?  It seemed to work for everybody in the house.   Her landfamily was a single mom voice coach and music professor 17 years her senior, and her 2 children. The boys were not that interested in horses, but it was one passion the women shared...


She was surprised therefore to come home from working the Mane Expo to find one of her old Pony Club yearbooks on the coffee table between the young guys sitting there playing video games.  Even more surprised when the youngest commented that even though her helmet is not done up, she looks like a good rider, just sitting there on "a bay." Jill picked up the book and it fell right open to the photo of the horse-partner she remembered was named Baye.  There was a poem she'd written there too.  She wasn't thrilled to read it:

i am horse
people beat me with whips
stick spurs in my side
make me do jumps
or stop on a dime
BUT
i get carrots and apples
and room service food
people clean my room daily
i'm scratched and i'm cuddled
i'm horse and i'm loved.


"There's another picture of me in here," she showed the boys one where she was not mounted but was dolled up "EARINGS at the barn!? Nailpolish too. I guess to match the chaps?"

She could actually remember that day.  She was coaching students at a show and recalled how lil Mr. Poppy won a white ribbon for third place and screeched her name in quite a scene and was running to show it to her up close up, when he fell with it in a huge mud puddle in front of all the spectators.

"They gave him a new ribbon." She emphasized his gender as she gestured to the boys, showing his picture and telling them how he'd purchased his horse with his commercial money.  They were both actors.  His profile read pony club level, D age 8, mount:  Pop, 3/4 arab 1/4 welsh 4 yr old chesnut pony, 13.2 hands

"Pop is very nice and she protects me. Once she tried to climb a ladder because other students asked her to. Her brothers and sister are show ponies in the states. She bucks but I don't fall off anymore. She loves the stallion at our barn. She comes into season everytime he walks by! She's a silly pony and we all love her A LOT!"

His quote about why he enjoyed pony club was "the snacks and the movies and christmas."

Jill didn't seem to have been asked that question.  But it stuck in her mind how the caption about her mount Baye, was actually the story of her whole entire life: "I've been riding this horse all summer but the owner is back so I'm not sure who I will be riding now,  perhaps the very green mare that's just arrived..."
*
Before she'd taken the week long contracts to work the booth at a few different equine trade shows for the bitless-bridle folks, she'd done a few personal trials, at stables she frequently visited ~ mostly focused on horses she really thought might really benefit, but also on those that the one cob-sized nurtural model she'd picked up would simply, actually fit.  


First she took it to the cowboy's place, where she was riding the only English horse on the property.  A challenging mount to get over the bridge/creek on the driveway and sometimes a speedy/spookster, she'd asked the handsome property owner to keep her company while she tried the little thoroughbred completely BITLESS for the first time ever.  It felt good to be under the supervision (aka full on one on one attention) of such a sexy handsome, ha.  He didn't think bitless was a big deal at all, in fact every horse he broke went in a hackmore as the first step ~ which was also good influence.  Jill did not concentrate on the fact that he tended to ride quiet quarter horses, while her mounts could tend a little more to the firey side.  And then, not only did the new bridle fit her horse-friend perfectly it work like a charm, both indoors and out, for the goals of the ride that day.


At the english place she was teaching, there was marvellous success with the flea-bitten grey school pony who had the terrible headshaking habit.  Jill had always thought it looked like the sweet, calm mare was in pain rather than being difficult and had suggested to the boss/owner countless times that she suspected a tooth problem.   She was not at all surprised that the dead quiet school horse did better in the trial tack, and Jill was delighted to imagine beginner students balancing on the reins with no bit. 

She'd only used it on the speedster of a black mare she hoped would be her partner for the Level 8 Rider Exam once. The little black pony that was so strong indoors and out, driven or ridden, didn't seem easier or harder to stop with the alternating gear, but Jill missed the feeling of having the beauty on the bit!

During the fair, Jill did not admire the design of the one in use for the first time in the North arena, as much as the figure 8 design of the one she was representing. Overall, she was actually quite unsettled by the unsafe nature of the tent pegging display! She was glad when they stopped it and concluded it as they did, but she wondered if it would be detrimental to her sales.  It was true that both horses it worked really well with in her experience would be proven to have tooth issues shortly thereafter, but Jill was still able to sell the product, honestly, from the heart, because of the trials...