I rode Her Royal Highness yesteday in a class lesson with my trainer. I tempted fate when I was looking for the horse that turned out to be Lily: I said something at one point along the lines of “at least, if I find another horse, he can’t be as difficult to deal with as Hap.”
I didn’t quite fall in love with Lily the way I did with Hap, but it was close. As we drove off after me trying her for the first time, my trainer and I were both rather quiet. Finally, the only thing my trainer could say was “Pity she’s a mare.” I told her she was prejudiced.
I try to keep things in proportion: Lily, in the two years I have owned her has been occasionally frustrating, but never terrifying. Hap could be terrifying, and during the early days, especially, there were times when I had to force myself to ride him each day, because I was afraid it I took a break I would never have the courage to get back on him. Hap reminded me of the nursery rhyme: when he was good, he was very, very good, but when he was bad he was horrid.
Lily’s frustration for me has been more along the lines of trying to figure out why she was fabulous one day and only good the next. There has also been the ongoing problem of finding saddles that suit her. Right now, I am riding her in my dressage saddle, which makes jumping awkward since dressage saddles are not designed for a forward seat. At one point, I bought a Western saddle for her because she liked it and she didn’t like any of my saddles at that point. Now she does’t like that saddle quite as well as my dressage saddle and an expensive cell foam pad I am borrowning from my trainer. She also decided that another expensive pad that I bought for her doesn’t feel quite as good as it once did. Since she is young and still changing physically a solution that works at one point may no longer work six months later.
Take yesterday. Lily was very forward (moving along quickly) to start. Forward is usually good, though young horses can be so forward that they lose their balance. Lily is too balanced for that to be a problem, but my trainer asked me to reseat my saddle and the cell foam pad that is Lily’s current choice for best pad. We moved the pad about half an inch. That seemed to make a difference: Lily slowed to her normal working trot, but I was having trouble keeping my weight in my left stirrup, leading her to drift to the right. My trainer suggested I shorten my left stirrup one hole. Lily spent the rest of the lesson being Miss Perfect.
From my point of view, these are all very subtle changes, though Lily doesn’t seem to think so. Horses are extraordinarily sensitive creatures. One of the advantages of having your own horses to ride is that they become very tuned to you. They are not having their sensitivity overwhelmed by many riders the way a lesson horse or livery horse does. Obviously, this can also be a drawback. My trainer and I are fairly certain that Lily wouldn’t be nearly as sensitive if she were handled differently, since the reaction of a lot of riders and trainers is basically “Just because you aren’t completely comfortable doesn’t mean you shouldn’t keep working, so suck it up!”