Horses have always been my passion since as long as I can remember, which is very odd as no one in my family rode horses. All of my most prized toys were horse-themed, starting with the obligatory rocking horse, then horse-on-a-stick and moving on to My Little Ponies, the Barbie horse and other model horses.
When I was six years old I was lucky enough for family friends to take me on a guided trail-ride. Now keep in mind that the family friends were an 80-something year old couple who stayed in the car the entire time, and they were even gracious enough to opt for the two hour ride vs. the one hour ride. I was a bit disappointed that they would not let me ride the biggest horse available, but quickly settled on the pony with a huge grin on my face. I will never forget those magical two hours of complete bliss... never caring about the obstinate pony I rode that kept trying to dive for grass, or the snotty girl who got to ride the big horse, I was in heaven and never wanted it to end. I knew from then on that my place was on the back of a horse.
It took six more years before I was able to take any real riding lessons. We had moved to Illinois (from Wisconsin) and my mother had met a co-worker that had a horse and was very generous in giving me lessons on her horse, which was boarded at a private farm in Batavia, Illinois. His name was Chance, he was an older white quarter horse/arab and was a saint! I was in love! Soon enough I was shareboarding Chance and riding him 3-4 days/week. I would even ride my bike for hours to/from the barn if no one was able to give me a ride. I would spend countless hours at the barn, grooming, riding, cleaning tack and just laying in the pasture with the horses. Chance was my first everything- my first canter, my first jump and my first dump! But, as kids often do, I grew tired of old Chance and yearned for something more challenging.
My grandmother (who was terribly allergic to horses, hay and anything else associated with a barn) made some telephone calls and arranged for me to work with a dressage trainer at Lamplight Equestrian Center in Wayne, Illinois. The trainer's name was George Schimpf and he intimated the hell out of me! Since I was an eager kid with a meager background, George was gracious enough to let me work (clean stalls,groom and tack horses, hand walk horses, etc.) in exchange for lessons. This was my first encounter with European warmbloods bred for dressage and jumping- talk about intimidating! I remember having to stand on stools just to brush the horse's backs and put their bridles on! George believed in lunge lessons for the beginner, so for the year that I was with George, it was all equitation work. I worked hard, but the lessons got less and less frequent and soon I moved on to shareboard a horse named Breezy (an appendix), who belonged to my grandmother's friend. Breezy was a very tolerant horse- put up with all my crap (i.e. jumping weird objects, trying to do moving mounts from the mounting block, galloping down sides of roads, etc.) and never killed me or caused serious injury. He was perfect for me- trained enough not to buck me off but untrained enough to put up with my BS and not be offended! I rode Breezy for a couple of years, but then the teenage years sunk in, I got a car (which came with a job- LOL) and horses got put on the back burner for more adult responsibilities.
Then fast forward about six years... (to be continued)
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