The Beast at the July Stoneleigh-Burnham H.T (photo credit to thehorsepesterer)
Top ten reasons why I love autumn in Vermont: 1) It’s absolutely breathtaking. When you ride through certain trails, you literally feel like you are taking a tour through a crayon box. 2) Apples galore. 3) Pumpkin pies and spices. 3) Its acceptable, and possibly even encouraged to pack on the pounds, because freezing temperatures are right around the corner! 4) Lots of trail riding. 5) Chai Lattes. 6) Cow herding. 7) Bye bye bugs. 8) Fit and feisty horses (which works in my favor). 9) Family hikes and homemade molasses cookies made by the one and only favorite mother of mine. 10) Finally, time to look back and reflect on the competition season. The up’s, the downs’ and the looking ahead!
Even though Denny refers to me as the GOV, ie Grumpy Old Vermonter, which is becoming more of a reality and less of a joke as the years pass, I really am in awe of where I am right now. I live in one of the most spectacular places in the country, even though I am a bit biased. Autumn in New England is a post card to many, and reality for me.
The one and only THF!
Back to why I am in awe. I tend to focus on the negative and I would definitely consider myself to be a realist/pessimist, hence the reason why Denny refers to me as a grumpy old Vermonter! Even though Valonia was desperately challenging on the flat, and was semi-inconsistent on xc in 2013, and Skybreaker seemed to want nothing to do with ditches, and was extremely unsteady in dressage, I think I have accomplished a great deal when I calculate all the positives.
To my surprise and despite having extremely challenging lessons at home, Valonia managed to be 2nd or 3rd after dressage in seven out of my eight events that I took her to. Valonia used to buck, kick out, and take down rings in dressage in her early years, and now she is becoming a serious contender. Also, her jumping has grown leaps and bounds. It used to feel like I was trying to operate a front-end loader, and now she is, dare I say, effortless? She still has many “mare-ish” tricks up her sleeves, but I am confident in our future together.
Skybreaker went from being 10th after several dizzying dressage tests, to consistently being at the top after dressage. He also went from slamming on the brakes at giant holes in the ground to learning that ditches aren’t that scary. He has become the fittest he has ever been. He won his first 10 mile judged trail ride. For anyone familiar with this big dude, you will not be surprised to hear he tends to be a SLOW MOVING and SLOW THINKING horse. Turning him into a quicker moving and quicker thinking horse has been quite the process, but is starting to pay off. This horse won every jumper show I took him to and he is the only horse I have ever ridden that casually and effortlessly lopes over 4’6”.
It’s so important to look back at the summer and reflect. Think about all you and your horse accomplished. Don’t fixate on one or two bad outings where you came home crying, or you retired at fence 4 on xc. Focus on the positive and give yourself and your horse a pat on the back. Gauging progress can be tricky, especially when you are examining the improvements over a seemingly short period of time. It’s easier to say my horse has come so far in the last 4 years. Instead of saying, wow, look at what we accomplished the last 6 months. You are certainly not alone when you think you made very little progress in one summer. But you have. You have to dissect the summer and look at where you were and look at where you are now. Are we perfectly content and satisfied at the end of the summer? Not necessarily, especially for all of us perfectionists, but we have to acknowledge the “good” and then we can move forward and start getting pumped for our 2014 competition season!
