Trust

I was riding Bandon Sunday night when I heard a car backfire on the highway that's just through the woods behind my arena. He flicked an ear in the direction of the noise and went on about the work I'd asked him for. I took a second to bask in a realization that I had something I hadn't had on horseback in awhile, trust.

I trailered Bandon by myself Saturday out to Cindy's farm to see a) how he handled hauling and b) how he handled riding in a strange place around other horses. In his memory bank, hauling = track = race.

My nerves were slightly shot when I pulled into Cindy's farm. Let's face it, I'm tightly wound to begin with, throw in trailering on a curvy road and I was a little frazzled.

Bandon came off the trailer on full alert and took off head and tail up running through the arena when we set him loose. Bandon looked at the goats running, horses running, dogs running, kids riding, donkey braying, with some concern that took about 30 minutes of running the fenceline to work out.

Still, once I was on him, he showed me he could hear me.

His interest in surroundings hollowed out his back and made his foot falls feel like they weren't making contact with the Earth. All I had to do was ask though, and he gave it to me. By the end of a short ride (he was coming up a little foot sore after having his racing plates put on 5 days earlier) his long neck stretched out with my hands on the buckle.

Cindy commented that he had a good brain, especially for a young guy. She mentioned that when she saw him arrive she didn't think I'd be able to get on him and not only did he calm but he listened! I think I beamed for the rest of the day. All the things he saw, dogs under foot, audience at ringside, barrels, chairs, goats, all of it with only 9 months time since his last race. Just one of those things would have put Whisper out of her senses, after years of training I've put in on her, and into react with no hope of return. Bandon reacted, then realized no harm would come to him and went on about his job without reacting a second time to any of it.

Back home for more jump training, we flew clear courses. Please oh please oh please let these shoes hold. Heaven is a ride on your own horse that you train, protect, love, and work hard for, all coming together in mutual trust of each other.

Tonight we tackled the change from crossrails to bar fences. He is jumping sequences of crossrails set at about 18" to 2' at the center well, though not always giving a lot of effort.

Brilliant boy is fun to fly on, the surge of power in him to take-off is a high I don't want to come down from.