Too many days off!!

So J was off for three days as I was visiting my in-laws for the weekend.  And unfortunately he had scraped his leg last week and would get stocked up in it if he sat for too long.  And of course, the weather was miserable on Friday, Sunday and Monday, so turnout did not happen.  Tawney was great and lunged him Sunday, which brought the swelling down and then I rode him on Monday night.

So Monday night he had some swelling, but it wasn't really bad considering that he had been inside on Sunday and Monday.  I lunged him in side reins first and he was a little short in the beginning, but worked out of it within the first few minutes.  He wasn't as silly as I expected him to be, so that was a nice surprise!  Then I got on, hoping to remember everything we had worked on in the lesson on Thursday and trying to get my body moving after a 5+ hour car ride from my in-laws.  J is very particular about our warm up and I have learned that if I rush him, it will take double the time to get him where I want him to be, so we walk on a long rein for about ten minutes, going both ways.  Then I take up a little contact and we do transitions within the walk, focusing on positioning and correct flexion.  Then we move to trot, first transitions within the gait and then doing walk/trot transitions going both directions.  If he is slow to my leg, we will move straight to canter and I get him into a decent in-hand gallop and warm him up that way. 

So we went through our warm-up routine, I was really trying to focus on keeping my position and not getting into my "hole".  You see, I like this "hole", it is very comfortable to me and J loves it as well, as he doesn't really have to work as hard when I get in my hole.  My hole can be pictured like this: hunched shoulders, wide hands, straight elbows, bend at the waist and looking down.  Now I've been told that it is not a terrible hole, but it is enough to interfere.  I mainly had to focus on his responsivity and mental focus, as he was distracted since he had not been worked or turned out in a couple of days.  Everything was okay; nothing great, nothing terrible.  I think we were both stiff and had to take a day to get back into the routine.  During my self-reflection on my drive home, I realized that I was too preoccupied with his head position and wasn't happy with myself because of that.  Because of my work schedule on Tuesday, I planned to ride him Tuesday morning and not let myself fall into that same routine.