The Horse's Eye

One of the things I like about doing groundwork with horses is that their beautiful eyes are right down at my level. A horse's eye lets you see right into her soul. Horses are utterly present in each moment, and completely without guile, and their eyes are so very expressive.

Today I had the privilege once again of working with a lovely Thoroughbred mare. Like many of her breed, she can be flighty and high-strung, and is sometimes a handful to manage. Our plan is to work with her and attempt to change her view of the world as a fearful place where she is not safe to one where she can relax and enjoy her surroundings.

My task for today was to help her learn not to run ahead of me, but to stop when I stopped, then take a step backwards when I did. This was not easy for her, and it took us quite a while to get it worked out. As we practiced, though, I would stop periodically and stroke her neck until she relaxed, and her head gradually dropped lower and lower.

Finally, after half an hour or so, I took a step forward and noticed her tuck her head as she walked next to me. She placed her feet with obvious care--she was paying close attention to me. After a few steps, I stopped, and she stopped--and backed up with me. The sudden change was wonderful to see--she finally understood exactly what I was asking, and did it because I asked her to.

The expression in her big, beautiful eye had changed as she looked at me. It is a wonderful moment, when a horse begins to trust you. Such a gift; such an honor. May I be worthy....

Day Four: The real work begins

Today Jay finally realized what I'd been telling him all along: I have no finesse with the most basic of basic skills, like asking a horse to yield his hindquarters, or back up. Yes, I generally get the job done, and to the untrained eye, it all looks fine.

But it's not fine. Jay's method is all about clarity and consistency of communication, and if you're not precise about the way you ask the horse to do something, she can easily get confused. A confused horse can't trust you enough to feel secure in your presence, and that's not a good thing at all.

So Jay started to get tough with me. Over and over, he'd correct me, and it seemed like half the time he'd tell me one thing one time and something different the next time I tried it. But that's actually part of the lesson--nothing about working with horses is cut and dried. Rather, it changes depending on exactly what's going on at any given moment.

What doesn't change is the absolute need for clarity with what you ask and the way you ask it. So I appreciated the drills, frustrating though they were. My mind might understand what Jay was asking me to do, but getting all my body parts to react appropriately while trying to manage my stick and string and lead rope and also keep my eyes on my equine companion--intense and very, very difficult.

Toward the end of the day, I was pretty worn out mentally, and my defenses were down. We were asked to lead a couple of horses back out to the pasture, where they would spend the night. Jay grabbed the "easy" one and left me with Gus, who proceeded to give me a bit of horsey attitude. He's a perfectly nice horse; he just wanted to get the haltering over with and go out to the pasture.

What's interesting to me about the interaction between me and Gus wasn't in the details, but rather in what I learned about myself. When he started acting up, I got "stern," as I always like to think of it, and raised my voice and my energy level. As soon as I did so, I realized that "stern" was actually combative. And it was based on fear. I could feel my tension rising and my breathing quicken.

Fight or flight: how do I react to fear these days? The pendulum lately seems to have swung to fight. But the fear remains. I'm not sure what I want to do about this, but it's good to be aware of it. I wonder how this relates to how I react in other situations?

Introductions: Days One, Two, and Three

Just in these first few days I've had a chance to review and practice so many simple, seemingly self-evident things I already "knew." Even more, I'm getting first-hand experience in just why these simple things are so very important.

This work is exciting, riveting, all-consuming to me, despite the fact that to a non-horsey observer, it probably looks boring and repetitious. Not to mention cold--we work either outside or in an unheated barn and indoor arena. The temperatures the first three days of my apprenticeship have been unusually cold for this time of year--nighttime lows in the teens or below, daytime highs not even reaching the twenties.

The first day began with watering down the arena to keep the dust down. This has to be done even in the winter. Dragging cold, heavy hoses around is not fun, but it's obviously the job of an intern. So are is making photocopies of riding releases, mucking a stall here or there, and hanging around with prospective adopters while the trainer is busy with a class.

I did get a chance to play with a couple of horses: walking them across tarps or through a maze of old tires, letting them jump small obstacles, having them play "go touch it" with objects in the arena. I also practiced having them back up, yield their hindquarters, and other basic safety moves. I discovered that when one is under Jay's watchful eye, it's a lot harder than it looks.

Lessons from Day One: Keep your feet planted as much as you can, be consistent with your spatial relationship with the horse. Don't move around randomly. Horses have a much more highly developed spatial sense than we do, and every micromovement counts. Not an easy lesson to learn. (Will any of them be, I wonder?)

Day Two was bitterly cold--it didn't get above 15 degrees all day. We didn't work the horses much at all--didn't want to risk getting them sweaty, then chilled. We did, however, work with the farrier (guess it doesn't matter so much if he gets sweaty).

One of my jobs was to help Jay get a one-ton Belgian gelding ready to have his hooves trimmed. First, we worked on getting him to back up and yield his hindquarters. After we got him limbered up and moving, I had to try to hold the horse while Jay wrestled with his enormous feet to be sure he would lift them without a fight. But after the work and the trim, I led the big guy back out to the field with two fingers on the lead rope.

Lesson from Day Two: Do not get into a shoving match with a horse. The horse will win. Especially if he weighs a ton.

Day Three was mostly about catching horses in the field, leading them to the barn (Herd Health Day: shots and deworming for almost all of them), and taking them back out. Wonderful fun! (I am serious.) It was very interesting to watch the herd dynamics at work even when all the horses were in the barn.

A major  lesson from Day Three was that to catch a horse, it's easier to draw him to you than to try to sneak up on him because you cannot sneak up on a horse. And in a herd of, say, three horses, you have to be aware of all three at once in order to catch any of them. Also, if the horse decides to move away from you, your job is to make him move with vigor--to make it way easier for him to stand still and let you walk up to him.

The big Belgian who gave me so little trouble on Day Two had different ideas on Day Three. When we got back out nearly to his pasture, there were a bunch of rowdy horses in the next-door paddock, and the Belgian started watching. Somehow my head got between him and something very interesting, and I got clobbered.

A Belgian's head alone must weigh a couple hundred pounds. Ouch. I was more scared than hurt, though. Jay showed me how to use the business end of the lead rope with enough energy to make the horse back up in a hurry and focus on me again. Those big fellows can move pretty fast in reverse gear, and when they're doing that, they're not nearly so scary.

I'm going to look back on those first three days very fondly, I'm thinking. It was an easy introduction to the next three months. Day Four was a different story entirely! More on that when I recover from it.

Learning Horsemanship at Sixty: The Adventure Begins!

Just last weekend I began a three-month traineeship at the Ranch where I've been volunteering for the last year or so. I'll be working with "Jay," my friend and the trainer there, learning pretty much all aspects of training and rehabilitating rescued horses.

This is a tremendous opportunity for me--to work with someone as talented as Jay, and with such a variety of horses. It's not a paying position; in fact, I'll be paying them back with even more volunteer hours. But it's a win-win situation, for sure.

Between now and the end of March, I'll be reporting on my experiences as a sixty-year-old woman, with less than two years of experience with horses, learning natural horsemanship from the ground up. My focus will be less on the techniques and exercises that I learn, and more on the internal, psychological aspects of the experience. So far, my work with horses has brought about noticeable changes in the way I interact with others, human and equine; and I expect it will continue to do so.

So here goes! I'm ready for a wild ride!

Breakthrough

It's been such an eventful couple of months, and it's hard to believe I haven't updated this blog in so long. But it's time, now. Things are shifting.

A quick summary: Galahad has moved to a private boarding stable about 30 miles west of here. He wasn't happy at his previous stable--he was constantly getting in trouble with the other horses, picking fights, wanting to play whether the other horses did or not. He'd already been seriously hurt once, and I knew it was only a matter of time before he was injured again, or hurt another horse. Something had to be done, so when this new opportunity arose, I jumped at it.

The new stable is significantly farther away from home for me, but worth it for Galahad. He's much better off, and that is the most important thing. A lot has happened since we moved him, and I'll have to update that in a few days, but something has shifted in me that is of major significance. I didn't realize it until a couple of days ago:

A friend and I went out to see him and work with him a bit. He needs work--in his new place he has grass pasture, woods, and gets to stay outside all night when the weather is fine, and so he's decided that he's a wild pony and doesn't have to do anything he doesn't feel like doing. Because of the adjustment--his and mine--I haven't been working with him as much as I used to.

Ground work is so important, and can be done anywhere and at any time, so we decided to take him for a walk. The trails at the new place are lovely, hilly but not steep, and a nice mix of woods and open fields. He hasn't been on them much yet, so it was all new to him.

My friend was leading him. She's been around horses a lot more than I have, so I didn't think anything about it. All was well until we got to the top of the hill—he got very wild and started pushing her around with his head and shoulders. She wasn’t staying on top of him, wasn't able to counter his pushiness. I realized that she was going to be in serious danger in a few more seconds, so I took the lead away from her.

It took all my skill to get him back under control and to lead him down the hill. But I did it. He walked down that hill slowly, stopping when asked, backing when asked, and we made it.

So what? you say. The significance of this is that before that moment, I would have backed off and let her deal with him. She has more experience, right? so she must know better than I do. And truthfully, she would have figured it all out and been fine. But for the first time, I knew that I was better able to deal with the horse in that moment, and without thinking about it, I stepped in. Or stepped up. Stepped into my own authority. Stepped into my mare energy.

Interesting, the timing. Tomorrow I begin a three-month traineeship with my friend and gifted horse trainer "Jay" out at the rescue ranch. It'll be hard work, physically and emotionally (not to mention that it's the dead of winter). Without mare energy, I can't work with troubled horses safely and effectively. But I have it (always have had it), and now I recognize and accept it, with humility and gratitude.

A very scary morning

So. Yesterday. The morning was chilly—the first real fall day—and a little breezy. When I got to the barn, there were several horses out in the pasture racing around, enjoying themselves immensely. Galahad was his usual self, glad to see me, anxious to get out and have fun. My plan was to ride him bareback down to the arena barn, like I always do, and then saddle him up.

Before I even got him out of his stall, I flexed him with the halter rope. He gave with very little fuss—a good sign, I thought, even though I could tell he was a bit rowdy. Who wouldn’t be, on a day like that?

I led him out to the cement mounting block near the geldings’ pasture. Just as we got there, one of the other boarders called to her horse, who came running up to the gate right there, along with a buddy. She got her horse out and led him past us, and the other horse galloped off. I flexed Galahad again, and he gave, though not quite as willingly, and I hopped on.

He stepped away from the block just a little before I got completely settled, so I corrected him—and as I did so, I realized that something was different. He stopped, all right, but with a head toss that I’ve not experienced before. This was not his usual head-down, shake to the side, bad-boy head toss. This one was some kind of nose-up jerking motion that was obviously more serious and far less light-hearted. I flexed his nose around to the right and kept it there for a minute, until he relaxed his neck. As soon as I let up, though, he jerked again. I flexed him to the left. He stood, then, and I asked him to move forward. He jumped and twitched, then jerked his head, and I realized that I was in trouble.

When I got him to stand quietly again, I could feel his tension. I wanted off his back, and soon, but couldn’t just bail. He agreed to tuck his head for me, and I got him to back up a step, then side pass about two steps; then I got off.

Thinking that maybe it was proximity to the pasture that was causing the problem, I led him over to another mounting block behind one of the barns, and got on again. This time things were, if anything, even worse.

It felt like I was riding a powder keg: I could feel him ready to explode at any moment. When I so much as touched him with my lower legs, he twitched and started to jump. If I released the rein pressure at all, he got light in the forehand and danced. I could feel the fear rising in my gut, something I have never felt before when riding that horse, not even when he bucked or even when I got back on him, head aching, after he spun me off. I was way out of my element here, in physical danger. And of course, the more fear I felt, the more jumpy Galahad got.

Despite the obvious threat, he hadn’t actually bucked yet. And with a horse, once he “wins,” you “lose,” and I did not want that to happen if I could safely (more or less) prevent it. So what, I asked myself, was the smallest “win” I could imagine in this situation?

By this time we were standing with his head cranked around to my left foot. I didn’t dare let him straighten it out, because when he did, he started to dance and hop. I did manage, somehow, to remember to relax my legs and seat and sit up straight, even though my body and mind were both screaming, “Tick mode! Hang on with everything you’ve got!!” I grabbed a handful of mane with my right hand and kept pressure on the left rein. So we stood, for probably five minutes, until he not only quit pulling, but let out a sigh.

However, it was quickly obvious that we weren’t out of the woods. He was still twitching and quivering and tense as all get-out. I didn’t dare let go of the rein holding his head to the side, but I did, after several tries, get him to step his hindquarters around quietly, without spinning. Whew--a "win," however small. Once he yielded, I told him what a good boy he was and got off, without releasing the flexion. I was never so glad to feel solid ground under my feet as at that moment.

Our work wasn’t done. He was wild-eyed and high-headed, quivering with defiance. So I made him back up until he settled down a bit, then led him back to his stall and switched the bridle for the rope halter. For that, he stood quietly, probably assuming he was done for the day. Sorry, my friend, but you’re not getting off that easy.

Galahad was in no mood to obey, and certainly in no mood to back up—but back up he did, all the way down the lane between the barns, past the gate to the geldings’ pasture, past a couple of horses tied up, down the incline, and into the muddy swale from the shavings pile out to the arena.

Mud!!! Sir Galahad the Prissy hates mud above all else, and being asked to back into it and across it was just too much. He reared and squirmed and nearly jerked the lead rope away, but I went with him and hung on to the end of it. He turned, still backing up, and actually found himself backing along the swale—horrors!

Finally, when he figured out I wasn’t the one who was going to do any backing down, he stopped, put his head down, and heaved a big sigh. Thank goodness he never discovered how close I was to giving up on what seemed like an impossible task.

From there, we walked the short distance to the arena barn. He wasn’t perfect, but didn’t offer any more of a fight.

Needless to say, I did’t ride him yesterday. He did get to run in the jump arena, like a mad thing, and chat with a few horse friends over the fence. Then, once I got a buggy whip, he did some work for me in there—I didn’t have speed controls in place, but I did have directional control, though it was a near thing a couple of times. It's a pretty strange experience to stand, armed only with a whip and a helmet, in front of a galloping horse and know that he will turn in the direction you demand.

After all of that, when it was time to go in, he walked with me clear across the arena to get his halter back on. And best of all, on the way there, I “sent” him across a scary couple of downed rails, and he went with no argument at all.

So all in all, I guess it was a good day. But I’m still pretty shaken up. We’ll see how he is today, and maybe I’ll get up the nerve to saddle him up for a bit.

Mia

I spent yesterday afternoon out at the rescue ranch, working with “Jay,” the trainer there. We were chatting in the arena when one of his volunteers, an experienced dressage rider, saddled up a recently rescued filly. The volunteer had just finished working with another horse, an exceptionally nice mare with a pleasant and willing attitude.

The other little horse, Mia, was one that Jay had been showing to a potential adopter, a woman with two youngsters, when I arrived at the ranch.

I watched as the volunteer mounted the filly and rode her around the arena. It wasn’t long before she and Jay started talking about how wooden and unwilling this filly was. I could see that the woman was having trouble—the horse didn’t want to move, and did nothing at all without a fight of sorts. “Hard” was the description: to get her to back up or turn, the rider had to haul on her head as though it were a block of wood. The little horse didn’t try to buck, just didn’t seem to want to do much of anything.

“Well, you should have ridden her first, before you got on [the other horse]. Then this one wouldn’t have seemed so bad,” offered Jay.

“She has no heart,” said the woman. “She has the spirit of a wet noodle.” I protested at that description.

The woman got off. Jay took the reins. “Yeah, she’s not like [the other horse]. And she’s pushy. She pushed that other woman all over the arena while we were talking. Her size would make her a good kid’s horse, but with that pushiness, maybe not.” As they were talking, Jay handed me the reins and unsaddled the horse.

“What does that mean, she has no heart?” I asked them. To the filly, I suggested we needed to change her name to Noodle, and gave her a good head scratch. She just stood there, but she let me scratch her. When she blinked her eyes, I stopped scratching for a moment, to let her think about things.

“A good horse will do anything for you. This one doesn’t want to do anything at all—you have to make her.”

By now, something about the discussion had started to bother me. I started to lead Mia around. She didn’t really want to move, but with a “send,” and a not-too-gentle tap on her withers, she came with me.

Jay swapped the bridle for a rope halter, and the filly and I did some stopping and backing up. Again, she needed quite a bit of reinforcement to move, and she did seem pretty shut down. She didn’t really offer much of any response at all at first, but as we worked, she became more willing.

After I made her back nearly to the end of her lead rope and then had her come to me, she started to sniff me, and ended up with her nose buried in my shirt front. There she stood for quite some time, head down, just breathing, while I scratched her head and neck.

At one point, although I didn’t really see her move, I sensed that her attention had shifted and she was on the alert. Looking around, I saw that one of the other staff members was walking along the aisle. Interesting. I would have expected the filly’s head to go up, or the ears to flick, or something. Mia had made no detectable movement.

By this time, with no evidence but my gut, I was convinced that there was more to this filly than Jay and the woman rider were giving her credit for. This was no plug horse, no mean and pushy horse. Something was behind those beautiful eyes. What this little filly needed was relationship. She needed someone to believe in her and care for her. What she did NOT need was a person riding her who already believed she was worthless and hard and unwilling.

I led her around a little more, got her to yield her hindquarters, backed her up again. She did better this time. Then she started following me around, with no pressure at all on the lead rope. By the time Jay backed her out of the arena to return her to her stall, even he noticed how willingly and steadily she moved.

As we left her stall, Jay told me Mia’s story: She had been one of thirteen LIVE horses on the property she had been rescued from. The other thirteen were already dead.

This little filly haunted me all day and all night; her story needs to be told, it seems. Mia…MIA…missing in action. Mia’s heart is Missing In Action.

What horrors this little horse has seen in her short lifetime we will never know. Horses are intimately connected, psychically as well as physically, to their herd. Imagine the trauma of starvation and thirst, and the horror of feeling your friends and playmates die in front of your eyes, the terror of knowing there is no way out for you, either. Humans offer no hope, no succor.

How dare we judge this horse, or others like her? How dare we say, “She has no heart”? How dare we expect her to respond to us, to do our bidding with pleasure and willingness, when she is so shut down and traumatized by what we humans have done to her and her kind?

Please believe me when I say that I am not romanticizing this horse, nor downplaying the fact that she could be dangerously pushy, even at her small size. She is a survivor, and she will do what she needs to do to become dominant over anyone and anything in her environment, as a matter of survival.

However, in just those few minutes I spent with her, quietly asking nothing more from her than respect for my space while honoring hers, there was a difference. I know this, though the evidence for change was slight. I felt the difference, and so did she.

Mia’s heart will return, if she finds someone she can trust and respect, someone who believes in her and loves her. For that person, this filly will walk through fire. I pray that she finds such a friend. To that friend, she will give her whole, beautiful heart.