I went to the barn with an agenda on Friday. Never a good thing; fortunately I got away with it. I wanted to get on Matilda so badly after seeing Loryn up there the day before. The barn was crowded, as it always is these days. With camp every morning almost all the lessons have to happen after one o'clock and there is rarely, if ever, a time that the ring is empty. If I am lucky, I can find a time when there is only one lesson or one practice ride going on. I know that it's good for us to work with all those distractions but I was admittedly out of sorts on Friday for unknown reasons, feeling hurried and impatient. Wanting time to myself. Snarky...
I try to be as unobtrusive as possible when I work with Matilda, working around lessons and other riders. This wasn't possible on Friday. I had to ask to take over one end of the riding ring, pushing four other riders to share the other side. Like I said, the barn was crowded on Friday.
It was just me and Matilda. We started with some review and I noticed that her "over" was really imprecise. A couple of weeks ago, I put my finger on her shoulder and asked her to "over" and she stepped over with just her front feet. This afternoon the same action got a full body lateral shift with a step back at the end. We did it several times before she even came close to doing it correctly. I was not impressed. We worked on it a little while, going up and down her sides and asking her to step over. I asked just until she gave me something that (if I squinted my eyes and tilted my head to the left and with the sun behind her) looked a little bit like what I wanted. Did I mention I was not impressed? Next time I am at the barn I will most likely spend all of our time reworking those ground commands. As much as I want to work on new stuff, I guess I have to set aside days to reenforce those things.
After I hurried through our review I put her on the longe line. I shouldn't have been surprised to find her quick and unfocused. A perfect reflection of my own attitude.
She walked when I asked, but I had to ask her to "whoa" at least a half dozen times before she stopped. I clicked for stopping and tried again. Same thing. I could tell she just wasn't listening and I could see the possibilities of me getting on Matilda's back fading into the ether.
As we struggled through our workout, I stumbled across another take off trigger, too. At the end of one of our circles, I dropped the longe whip on the ground and went to her to give her a reward for half decent behavior. I asked her to "walk on", which she did nicely, but when I bent over to pick up the whip she tried to take off! Huh, I thought, that's weird. Then it struck me that all of my desensitizing exercises with dropping and picking up the whip had been done while she stood still. This was the first time I had tried to pick up the whip while she was already in motion. All plans had to go on the back burner in order to fix this.
I asked her to "walk on" and bent down to the whip, she picked up that quick trot and I had to stand up quickly and use both hands to bring her back to the walk. I let her walk for a while then bent my knees to about the half way point, she picked up the quick trot with a head toss. Sigh. Up again to bring her down to the walk. OK, third time's the charm. I barely bent my knees, she sped up the walk but this time I was able to click before she trotted. It's pretty much a given (as much as these things can be) that when she hears the "click" she stops (thank You, Lord). She did so in this instance and I rewarded.
I asked her to walk again and after a few circles did another knee bend - click. Again, with a slightly deeper knee bend. We probably did this 10-12 times, with me getting a little closer to the ground each time, before I could pick up the whip while she continued to walk. The whole time I could feel my mental fingers drumming away on a mental table top with impatience.
Of course we had to do the same thing on the other side. Fortunately it took less time, as she was already familiar with the exercise.... I guess.
Now for the moment of truth. Did I dare?? The four riders had left the ring, but two more had come in for lessons. One little girl on a pony (I think it was a little girl on a pony, I was only half paying attention... you know, like Matilda) and one teenager on a young horse still in training. Not the ideal situation. Especially since Matilda was not listening to me on the ground.
But how could I not?! So, on went the helmet and Matilda and I walked to the mounting block. I clicked for lining up almost perfectly with the mounting block. I clicked for standing perfectly still while I hoisted myself up.
I wanted to see if she would respond to simple voice commands so I said "walk on" without giving any indication with my body of what I wanted (This is harder than it sounds. It's sort of auto-pilot-motion memory to squeeze with your legs as you ask for the walk.) and she just stood there. I said, "Matilda, walk on." and she stood there. I said, "Matilda, waaaalk ooooon." And she moved forward! No, just kidding, she still stood there. Finally I gave her a little squeeze with my ankles while asking her to walk on and she did (click!)
Then I asked her to "whoa" and she kept walking. So I squeezed back with the reins and asked her to "whoa" and she did (click!)
We spent about 10-15 minutes in just this way: walking, stopping, dismounting and re-mounting. All with relaxed loose reins and as little physical encouragement as possible. (Remember, one of our new goals is for her to respond to voice commands only from the saddle.) We now know that Matilda and I have to work on our coordination in getting carrots to her from the saddle. It's a little awkward but every time she stretches that head around to get a carrot from my hand, she is stretching her neck, loosening up and learning to bend. Bonus!
I wish I could end on this positive note, but as I finished my last dismount (click!) the food cart went past... Whatever little bit of good Matilda there was immediately vanished. I tried to hose her down but she would not stop moving and punching me. I finally just took her out to her paddock and turned her loose. We'll save working through feed time for another day. I was so frustrated by the time I took her out to the pasture that I did not realize until I was on my home how easy it was to lead her out. I know she was focused on getting to the food, but she never got ahead of me or punched me to try and get me to move faster. It would be quite simple (and some horses do) for her to try and rush and pull me along, but the whole way back to the paddock her head was near my shoulder... of course there was no time wasted either:)
On a second sad note, I have lost some of my contact with Loryn. Stupid school is already getting in motion and preparations intrude. We will try to figure out how to get together at least once a week but I am sad. I feel like the three of us were just hitting our stride together. stupid school. I am grateful for how she has motivated me to pick things up through this summer. I wouldn't be where I am without her involvement. We'll find a way to continue working together in some fashion. In this I am confident.
A new week begins. I see a lot of "walk on" and "whoa" in my near future. At least I will be in the saddle for some of it and that's where I want to be.
P.S. School is important. School is good. If you are in school, stay in school. Blah blah blah ;)
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