From Yvette:
Tips for Eventers Living in Itty-Bitty Apartments in the City: The Defensive Driving Edition
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Hey there, Eventing Nation! For those of you who read my post from last week, I am happy to inform you that I am now fairly proficient in navigating around my new office building without an escort OR marking my trail with a stack of Post-It notes, which is a good thing because I was really worried about Depends not being so flattering under my business suits. And while random bits of useful information still manage to crop up (“Wait…I have a reserved parking space?”), I think it’s safe to say that I’m getting settled into my new role…just in time for my eventing season to get started (cue theme song). And while the weather this past Sunday left much to be desired in terms of, say, warmth and dry clothing, the Super Pony and I were grateful for the efforts of the Morven Park team and volunteers in making the start of our season successful, safe, and fun!
The start of a new competition season is always exciting – there’s the opportunity to test the new skills practiced over the winter, the anticipation of the starter counting down from 10, and that general anxiety associated with not really knowing where you stored your show clothes for the winter (luckily for me, I live in an itty-bitty apartment, so there aren’t really THAT many places for a stock tie to hide!) The first event of the season also serves as a reminder that I will spend the next few months with purple-stained cuticles (thank you cruel Eventing Gods for blessing me with grey and pinto partners!) and that I will need to adhere to a strict laundry schedule to keep my building’s Tenant Association off my case (I mean, seriously, where else am I going to wash hairy saddlepads???) Most importantly, the beginning of the season reminds me of the most inherent danger of our sport: the warm up arena.
Let’s face it – warming up at a horse trial, particularly one early in the season event with crisp temperatures, is a full contact sport. There’s snarling, squealing, and kicking – and that’s just from the coaches watching from the sidelines! Add a fresh young OTTB or a couple of first time competitors to the mix and it’s like you’ve spiked the punch at the office party…it’s just not pretty. Come to think of it, it looks very much like my daily commute, which leads me to this week’s tip.
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Tip for Eventers Living in Itty-Bitty Apartments in the City #33:
Does warming up for dressage with about 20 other horses in the ring stress you out? This is where eventers who reside or work in major metropolitan areas have a critical advantage! Navigating high traffic thoroughfares such as the Capital Beltway (AKA the Fifth Circle of Hell) during rush hour teaches one how to deal with a high volume of individuals piloting large objects in a confined space. You will learn how to detect subtle (or not so subtle) cues indicating the intentions or mood of your fellow drivers, as just like in warm-up, it is highly unlikely that they will utilize the most obvious communication devices (the elusive turn signal on a car, or their voice in the warm up ring) to relay this information. And that joker who manages to be oblivious to the gajillion cars around him as he swerves all over the road while getting overly animated on a conference call? Learn to quickly identify and avoid the situation, just like that person who insists on planting him/herself on a 20m circle in a prime area of the ring. Save your energy for important things, like steering out on cross country.
