I wonder if Ruth remembers???

I wrote this for mouthy mondays on mugwump chronicles about an endurance ride my dear friend Ruth and I did years ago... I wonder if she remembers it like I did?


I must have been about 14 and my favorite riding buddy at the time was 12. We found a flyer for an endurance ride at the local feed store. It was over the same trails we rode almost every weekend. We just knew we were going to be a shoo-in to win this ride. We had no idea what the ride entailed or what endurance rides were all about, we just knew that our horses knew those trails and were in excellent physical shape. We were giddy and excited about our big find and made a pact not to tell the rest of our little group so we wouldn’t have so much competition.

The ride started way out on the outskirts of town instead of at the trail head. It only added a few miles onto the ride itself but since we didn’t have a horse trailer it would add a good 5 miles to our ride. But we figured that if we just rode more and more on the days leading up to the ride and really kept our horses in tip top shape we could do it. So we planned, rode and did everything a couple of teenage girls could dream up to get in shape for the big event. We made sure our horses were shod two weeks prior, we each bought some light weight saddle bags to carry our food and drinks in and of course we talked about what to wear.

So the big day comes, we get up, are saddled and ready to go by 3:30am. The ride started at 8:00 am but we wanted to be there in time to let the horses rest for a while before we actually took off on the ride. It was dark outside when we took off down the rode. We figured that the fastest, shortest way to get to the starting point was to go down the main drag through town. It was a large four lane boulevard, shouldn’t be too busy at 4am and after all there were plenty of stoplights. Finally we get down to the freeway, (yes I said freeway) and we decide that the safest place to ride on a major freeway is in the median or middle. Heck is was all nice and level, with sand and gravel. The horses didn’t seem to care about the traffic and it was getting light outside. You know how when you think about how far someplace is you always think that it is less than it actually is? Well we rode on the freeway for quite awhile when our friendly local Highway Patrol officer pulled off in front of us. He was a little more than annoyed with us. The conversation went something like this… Officer: “Girls what are you doing riding on the freeway, don’t you know it is illegal to ride horses on the freeway?” Us: (scared half to death) “No sir, we are on our way to an endurance ride that starts at the Garden Drive exit.” Officer: “You didn’t see the sign on the on ramp that says BICYCLIST AND EQUESTRIANS PROHIBITIED?” Us: “No Sir, it was dark when we came on to the freeway.” I thought his head was going to explode. We were quiet as church mice as he stood there scratching his head. I am sure he was trying to figure out how to get us off the freeway in short order. Then he says “Do you know I can site you for riding your horses on the freeway? Do your parents know you are out here?”

We both start to bawl. Site us, tell our parents, we were dead. Of course no one had bothered to ask us how we intended to get to the big ride and we definitely knew better than to volunteer that information. He finally tells for us to get to the Garden Drive exit as fast as we can and to NEVER, EVER, pull a stunt like this again. We wipe the tears away and thank him a million times over and start back out on our journey.

We had lost time and he expected us to hurry so we start long trotting to the exit. As we approach the exit we are sure we are late and that everyone has left without us. No one was there. No horse trailers, no horses, nothing. We get our maps and entry material out and we start to look at them. Upon closer examination we realize that the ride doesn’t start here. This is the directions for people trailering into town to get to the trail head where the ride is supposed to start. DUH. We have ridden 5 miles out of our way and have to ride 5 miles back to the trail head. And in a hurry to even make it to the event on time.

Obviously, we can’t go back down the freeway. We have to ride the back roads. We chose not to take this route because is has a long, very narrow, two lane bridge high over the river. We had crossed it before but it was not horse friendly. A couple of months before a horse had been crossing it and had spooked, jumped over the railing and died. We vowed that we would never cross it again, but here we were, it was either the freeway or the bridge. We decided to take our chances on the bridge. We didn’t use the pedestrian walkway and led the horses right down the middle of the road stopping morning traffic. We made it across the bridge o.k. but at the end of the bridge is one of our local police officers. The conversation was very similar to the one we had with the Highway Patrol officer. He didn’t threaten to site us or call our parents but it was uncomfortable none the less. After a good 5 minute lecture on not riding in places that were not safe he let us go on our way.

By this time we were really late. We had another couple of miles to go before we got to the trail head. So we start long trotting to get there. We finally arrive at the trail head and the check-in staff looked at our horses like what the hell have these two been up to? When I got the look, I knew right away they thought we were idiots. We told our whole sorted story and they must have thought we were the stupidest kids on earth. They checked over our horses and released us to go. By the time we got to the end of the ride, our horses were tired and sweaty and so were we. They had traveled a good 8 to 10 miles further than any other horse there. And we still had to ride home. The actual endurance riders pointed and whispered. People that we knew pointed and whispered. It was embarrassing. The vet checked our horses and very nicely asked us what happened. We regaled the whole tragic story. Tears and all. He told us that even though our horses were tired and that they could use a drink, they were probably in better physical shape that most of the horses he had seen that day. I don’t know if he meant it or he just felt sorry for us. He told us to take the ride home slow and give them a good dinner and lots of fresh water and try again next year.

That was my first and last endurance ride. I have never felt like such a loser horse owner as I did that day. I never wanted to feel people looking at me or my horse that way ever again.

It was also proof positive that a horse will give you 110% of everything they have – and then some.

psst... I have a secret

Let me start by saying that I have a wonderful family and zillions, well maybe not zillions but tons and tons of wonderful friends. But I also have a secret. They don't know about this blog. I don't know why I haven't told them. I did tell trainer lady. She had started her own blog and we were talking about hers and I felt kind of deceitful not sharing that I had a blog. So why am I bringing this up now? Because my oldest daughter has started a blog. She has been writing for several days and is very excited about chronicling all of her adventures. As much as we are alike, we are very different. The first thing she did was post on Facebook and send everyone in her address book an email stating that she had started a blog.

Today I am going to introduce you to her.
My oldest daughter is a free spirit. She is her own person and no one is going to tell her anything. I realized this when she was about two. Telling her "Don't touch the stove, it is hot" to her meant "touch it-just to prove mom wrong". Of course when she would burn her little finger she would run around crying and carrying on like she was on fire. She is now 27 and still touching the stove. This has been our relationship forever. She has to figure things out on her own and I have learned to respect that. Along with that one streak of, shall I say independence, she has many qualities that I admire and respect. She is never afraid of trying anything new or different. She will always sit in the front row. Never afraid to say exactly what is on her mind, although I do wish she had a profanity filter sometimes. Not that I am a prude, I pretty much can hang with the sailors and potty mouth right along with the best of them. I swear she can talk to a rock. This is a trait that she got from her grandmother on her fathers side of the family tree. The girl has never met a stranger in her life. She is committed to her friends and family like gorilla glue. Undeniable loyal and honest, sometimes to a fault.

She works at an assisted living facility and cares for senior citizens. They absolutely love her. When she went to work there, I could see she was becoming very attached to some of the residents and it scared me. She wears her heart on her sleeve and I feared that she would have a hard time coping with the loss. I was concerned that the fall out from losing one of these new surrogate grandparents was going to send her into a emotional mess. But you know what? She deals with it with grace and dignity. She has been working there for several years and has lost a few of her "favorites". I am sure there are tears, but she handles it in her own way in her own time.

She has friends that have small children that she has pretty much adopted as her nieces and nephews. They call her "Auntie Poopsy". I have no idea why, and I don't know if I would answer to that but she delights in it. She goes to their baseball games, football games, dance recitals, school functions etc. I hope that her friends realize what a gem of a friend they have.


A link to her blog - it would tickle her pink if you checked it out...

http://babieswings.wordpress.com/


I guess it might be time to out myself and my blog.

True Friends

Being in the hospital drove me crazy - literally. On my second morning there I couldn't sleep. I was awake at 5am and bored to death. I had a tube up my nose and needles and IV's in my arms, a catheter and enough drugs in me to stop an elephant. Since I wasn't really having any pain - I did mention the drugs, didn't I? They gave me my very own button to push for pain meds. It was like the game show "Jeopary" clicker thing. It worked very well. No pain what so ever. No brains either. So this particular morning I decide that it would be very funny to take a picture of myself and text it to my friends. Let me clarify something... I have NEVER, EVER taken a picture of myself. Not once. So I get my Iphone out, take the photo and text it to my friends at 6 in the morning. I am in the bed just laughing hysterically to myself. This was just the most entertaining thing that I had ever done. I captioned it "don't I look pathetic". By 7ish they had all responded in some fashion or another. It wasn't till I got home some 3 days later that I was looking through my phone and came across said picture and remembered what I had done. I wanted to crawl in a hole and bury my head. What was I thinking? It was an awful picture, I did look absolutely pathetic. And at 6am. I really gave them something to wake up to! I have since apologized for my behavior and asked that they delete said photo. Of course I am sure that they all are hanging on to for blackmail purposes later on down the road.

Lotta stuff going on

I got a lotta stuff going on. First off I am still recovering from the bout of colic surgery. It takes so long to get my stamina back after surgery and laying around for a week. It has been 20+ days and I still don't feel back to normal yet. I don't like it. I was riding within 10 days but I just don't feel like myself yet. Not only that, but I have lost more weight than I hand intended to. I am down to 137 lbs and feel like I am too thin now. I am working on getting back to my normal diet and that should put those pounds back on. Hopefully over the next few weeks things will smooth out and I will be back to normal. Then I will quit whining. Maybe.


I have been to two horse shows since my surgery. I know what you are thinking. Maybe if I didn't do crap like that I would be feeling better. The first one I went to was 14 days after surgery. It was two hours from home and we knew that I would ride late in the afternoon. We left home at about 9am and got to the venue at 11am. I went and signed up for my classes. I hadn't pre-entered because I wasn't sure if I was going to feel up to riding. What I didn't know was that Semper had to have a competitive license for me to show him in the NRHA classes. Thank goodness they let you do that at the show. I had to have my daughter fax his registration papers to me and pay a fee but we got it done so I could ride. Then we waited. And waited. And waited some more. We rode and schooled some around 5ish and then tied him to the trailer and went to dinner. It has been unusually cold for CA this year and it started to get pretty chilly. We sat in the truck and ran the heater for about and hour and a half. At around 10:30pm I decided that I needed to go warm up again. I went out to ride and about froze what little butt I have left OFF. I entered the arena for my ride at 11:50pm. It was crazy to say the least. Plus we still had to drive home! Got home at 3:00am. It kicked my butt. I got a score of 68.5 which is 1.5 points higher than my last score. I was stoked about that. Semper went into an arena he had never been in before and did his job like a gentleman. I was really pleased with him. Everything was going along swimmingly until the stops and we are still having trouble there. I finally got the results for that show and I tied for 4th place in the Rookie 1 class and will be getting a check for a whooping $24.00. Better than a sharp stick in the eye! I placed 5th in the green reiner and there is no pay out for that class.

I worked stops some at my Wednesday night lesson and TL has been working him two days a week on stops so hopefully things are going to start getting better there.

Last Saturday I went to the second show in the series at the facility where I board. I entered the same 3 classes and I got a 67 in the Rookie 1 class and a 66 in the Green Reiner class. I don't know where I placed in the grand scheme of things yet but the judge wasn't handing out big scores so I think I did o.k. I only saw one or two scores in the 70's! I rode the green as grass class but by the time I ran the same pattern for the third time Mr. Semper thought he knew it better than I did and we had to have some education time. I just tried to school him through it. He really is a good boy and sometimes he is smarter than me. But he still needs to wait for me. The stops were better at this show but still not great. I know we can do it and it is going to click here pretty soon. I just have to quit over thinking it and he just needs to get his ass down and slide.

Now I know how a horse feels!

On Friday after work I went home and took a nap. After my little cat nap, which I never do, I got up and fed the horses and swept mopped the floors. We had purchased a Tilapia dinner from Trader Joes that I decided to cook it for dinner. I started to eat when the cramps started. They were pretty intense. They went on till about 10 pm when I finally went to my husband and said "Take me to the the ER". We had to go to Chico because Oroville's ER is a death trap literally. Another story for another day. It takes 25 minutes to get there but on Friday it only took about 15, my husband was really worried and his driving reflected it. I got to the ER room and it was full. I had to sit and wait. I waited for an hour and a half before they admitted me. I told them over and over again that I was having severe cramping but because my blood levels were so low they just knew that I was bleeding internally somewhere! I went through all the tests they asked me too and still they were not believing me that it didn't have anything to do with my iron levels. My surgeon came in and within 5 minutes told me what was going on and had me off to surgery. He said that a small piece if my bowel had gotten caught in the loop of another piece cutting off the blood flow,causing my symptoms and pain. My first thought was... crap I just had colic surgery. I had a bout of colic. Now I know first hand how it feels and let me tell you... IT HURTS, Probably the most intensive pain I have ever experienced - including child birth. Next time you horse has a gut ache or anything like that.... cut him or her some slack. I can now understand how fast it comes on and how really painfully it is.

Things are getting back to normal but I really wanted to show the first weekend in April and the doc isn't being very cooperative. I know better than to do anything stupid, but it won't stop me from asking. Training lady is riding semper for me till I am 100% back in the saddle which is a really good thing.

$7 in the hole!

Surprise! I got a check in the mail from our second show! How funny. I never gave much thought as to where I placed in the overall scheme of things at the horse show. I was just trying to get a better score than my last show - which I did. I placed 4th and got a check for $13 - it cost me $20 to enter the class! I guess $13 is better than a sharp stick in the eye! So I spent my first winnings on this picture.

Things - they are a changin'

I guess what I really mean to say is that life is changing.
When I started riding again after my 25 year hiatus, I made new friends. Trail riding buddies. It was great, we would get together a couple of times a week and hit the trials. We would come back to the trailers and have a bite to eat and a cold drink, chat and plan our next trail ride. It was great - for awhile. Then I started to want more from my horse and myself. The show ring was calling. I had always enjoyed showing but knew that I didn't want to show halter, western pleasure, trail, etc. I had been dreaming of doing working cowhorse and reining. Instead of just going for it, I chose to try Trail Trials instead. My thought process was that I had a great trail horse and I was going to just take the Trail Trial world by storm! Not. Since that didn't work out I turned my focus to reining. I still was trail riding some with my friends but not near as much. My trail riding buddies were all very supportive and encouraging but the more that I worked towards my goals, the less and less phone calls I got to go for trail rides. I don't think I went trail riding more than three times last summer. I don't hear much from my trail riding buddies anymore. When I see them we spend a lot of time chatting and catching up and we talk about trail riding together again, but it never materializes. I had made new friends at the boarding facility and we were kind of all on the same page. I was slowly working towards reining and they each had goals of there own that didn't include going down the same trail a couple times a week. We would ride in the arena, drink beer, visit and hang out at the barn. Life was pretty good. Then I started to get that angst again to move forward. I made the decision to "shit or get off the pot" and sent Semper back to TL. It was tough not to have my favorite buddy around. He was with her for almost 6 months and it darned near killed me. In the end it was totally worth it. Now I had a nearly finished reining horse and was even closer to my goal of going back into the show ring. The only thing at that point that was holding me back was my weight. I made the decision to have surgery and my barn buddies were totally 100% supportive. I don't know if I would have had such a positive experience without the support of my barn buddies. But with surgery came big, huge, changes in my life. First off, I don't drink alcohol anymore. A lot of my social life evolved around having a drink or two or ten. And eating out - food, food, food. That all ended pretty abruptly. It has been almost a year since I had surgery, one of my barn buddies moved Washington and is pregnant (talk about life changing) and I have moved to a new barn. My other barn buddy moved with me. Her life is changing too. She is divorced, just moved out on her own, and is ready to find that someone special in her life. I am so happy for both of them. Jen is going to have a baby! Laura is moving forward and getting her life back on track. We still talk almost everyday. Jen and I text back and forth at least every other day or two.

Life is changing again for me too. Not sure what to do or that I even need to do anything. I am showing and more focused than ever. I seem to be spending more and more time by myself, on my own. My husband is hunting and fishing a lot, my daughters are out on there own, my son is 18 and all that implies! I am not complaining just pondering what other changes are coming up, what new friends I will make, and where this is all going to lead.