Friday 3 August 2012

Learning to Fly

When I bought Walker, I was assured that he had "no dirt" in him.  In other words, he doesn't buck, he doesn't rear, he doesn't spook.  That being said, Walker is a horse, not a mindless machine, and of course he does all of these things.  Is Walker an unsafe horse that spooks and rears all the time?  No way.  In fact, I would amend the description of Walker to say that Walker is not "malicious". 

I have ridden malicious horses in the past - horses who, when they buck, actually intend to throw their riders.  Walker is not one of these types of horses.  I get the impression that when Walker bucks, the idea that goes through his mind is that if I fall off, this would be unfortunate, but also a happy by-product of the unfortunate mishap because it means (or at least he thinks it means) that he is off the hook for work for the day.

That being said, Walker has supposedly reared my instructor off twice.  I imagine that it was probably intentional.  When my barn owner came to me and offered to find me another horse, I opted to work with Walker and his quirks instead.  Because I am clearly not qualified to train a horse (or re-train a horse), I enlisted the help of my instructor.  She rode him for a month.  Apparently, he had been given two months off before coming to me while the transaction was going down between me and his previous owners, and so it is understandable that he needed a tune-up.  Walker and my instructor got into only two major fights (both of which resulted in him rearing), but in Walker's defense, he probably didn't know what hit him after being transported from warm Iowa (where he thought he was on vacation) to Atlantic Canada bootcamp! 

After about a week of training, my instructor told me that there wasn't much to work on with Walker.  Sure, he had a few balance issues that she wanted to tweak and a few attitude adjustments to make, but otherwise, the problem was going to be me controlling Walker.

Walker has never reared with me.  He has done the occasional hop, but I've mostly just ignored them and reminded him that I was in control (however tenuous that control may be).  He's also spooked on me a couple times, as all horses do, but in general, he's a fairly bombproof horse in that regard. 

That is, until this past week's lesson. 

I have to admit that Walker's new bad habit (and one we clearly need to work on) is bucking at the lope.  While he is by no means a bronco (he's too lazy for that), he bucks lately at least once a day - only while loping, and almost always on corners, not on the straight.

This past week at our lesson, my instructor had us jogging some fairly easy patterns.  All I remember is one minute we were (relatively slowly) jogging over a couple poles, and the next, I'm shooting through the air like a catapult plummeting to the ground.  Everyone else in the lesson was at the other end of the arena so no one actually saw him throw me; all they managed to see was me in the air and then they heard the apparently fairly audible thud as I hit the ground. 

This was the first time sinceI have had Walker that he has thrown me, and the first time in YEARS that I have fallen off a horse.  The last couple times I fell off a horse, I simply slid off, but as I mentioned, I was definitely airborn for a few seconds this time.

Since no one saw it happen, no one knows what caused it.  My theory is that he spooked.  He was a little weird around that particular side of the arena earlier in the evening as well, and since we were jogging (not loping), I doubt that he felt the need to throw me.  Besides, as a general rule, Walker doesn't really have any dirt in him, and normally when he bucks at the lope, its nothing so substantial that I fear for my life.  Usually I get the impression he just wants to remind me that he can throw me, not that he wants to.

Needless to say, I'm a little battered and bruised, but the look on Walker's face was priceless.  He didn't bolt or run away after I fell off, he just waited patiently beside me like a puppy dog, looking down on me with an expression that said: "I am SOOOOOOOOO sorry. But I still get my treats, right?"

So I finally learned what it feels like to fly.  I guess it's true what pilots say - the landing is definitely the most difficult part!

And no, he did not get his treats!

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