Interesting Conversations and Dream Bridles

Although last week I designated Tuesdays and Thursdays as my "jump" days, I decided to ride Walker outside.  His days outside are limited and I know that he was cooped up for the better part of the rainy weekend.  I thought that I would be alone, as I normally am in the middle of the afternoon, but apparently the kids had no school so there were lots of people around.  I decided that because Walker is usually pretty bad outside these days with other horses around that I would ride him in the indoor for a half hour first and then take him outside.  This seemed to work pretty well and although I didn't have time to canter him outside before the other horses were brought in for suppertime (and I obviously lost the attention of my horse), I did get him worked in the indoor arena first and managed to keep his attention for the time I was outside.  I might try that tomorrow evening during my lesson since I'm desperate to do anything to get him to listen.

After that, I helped one of the girls finish bringing in the horses for supper, and we had an interesting conversation about one of my instructors.  There are a couple of instructors at the barn, but for the past few months that I've had Walker, I've been particularly unimpressed with one of them.  Don't get me wrong, I think that this particular instructor is great and she helped me a lot with Walker.  However, there's another girl at the barn who is quite a good little rider, and she seems to be the "star pupil", if you know what I mean.  This instructor spends a lot of time with her, especially at shows, and I was starting to get the impression in the summer that I was more of a waste of time, or at the very least, I was just something to get over with before she could move onto her better riders.  At one point, she even cancelled one of my private lessons and never bothered to reschedule (or refund my money), and although I let it go at the time, it still kind of irks me to this day.

Well, the girl who I was helping today had similar things to say about the instructor (and some not so nice things to say about the star pupil).  She said that she felt left out at shows especially since she was doing more classes than I was and needed just as much help if not more.  Her grandparents don't really know anything about horses, and in fact, at one show, I even had to tack up her horse while she got changed.  Our instructor was too "busy" with the other student to bother lending a helping hand.  Now don't get me wrong, I like this instructor a lot, and as opposed to the girl I was talking to, I do like the star pupil as well.  However, it's frustrating and discouraging, especially to a new rider like myself but also to someone like this girl who could use some help as well, that we have been virtually ignored. I am glad that I ended up having this conversation with her because I honestly thought that it was just me and that I was being dramatic - as I sometimes am!

On another unrelated note, I have found my dream bridle.  I say that with the full knowledge that I will probably eventually come down off the high I'm on and convince myself that I do not need this wildly expensive bridle and in fact a cheaper, more practical bridle will do.  But in the meantime, I just like to look at it and imagine how Walker will look in it, how the soft grip rubber reins will feel against my hands, how much more functional/practical/magical this bridle will be compared to my other, cheaper, synthetic, non-Amish made bridle...

Nunn Finer Event Bridle... drool...

Really, the power of suggestion has quite a significant effect on me.  I only found this bridle because I read a tack review of one of the bloggers I follow (SprinklerBandits), and I just happened to be dreaming of buying a new bridle.  Voila!  I became irrationally attached to this one.  Perhaps some day I'll get a clue. :S