Even the weather is against me: A big rant

So, I was ready to write a happy cheerful show report (Oats and I did the Sooke Saddle Club’s Show and Tell on Sunday and had a lovely time!), until it all blew up in my face and now he is dead lame, and I have a big horse show on Saturday, and work is insane, and I am losing perspective and spiralling rapidly. Like, really spiralling.

What happened to my Oats?

I am in a horrendous mood. I went to bed last night because I couldn’t stand the idea of having that day happen to me any more. I woke up feeling angry, pissed off, frustrated, stressed out and terrible. I said to my husband, and my colleagues: I have two modes this week: Asleep or horrible.

So, yeah. That’s how things are. It feels like even the weather is against me, with the World’ s Most Terrible Summer Weather TM happening allllll effing summer. Going swimming in the river, or at Thetis Lake? Not this year LOL!. Its so shitty. I’m pissed. I feel like I’m never going to be happy or reasonable again.

Beware world, I’m walking around with a chip on my shoulder the size of the Empire State Building and I am definitely taking it out on everyone around me. I wish I could sequester myself from everyone, because I know I am not being reasonable, or kind, or anything that should be infected on my (nice, decent people) surrounding me.

A challenge

I went quiet last week, partly due to a large amount of stress at work, but also due to horse stress.  Yep, they both happened on the same day…Don’t you just love it? After all the shenanigans Oats has gone through lately (stopping at fences, being a dick at horse shows, stopping again at fences, me falling off in a bad 7-day period…) things got even worse. Not for riding–that’s been fine.

Photo courtesy of Lindsay F.

Oats is all ‘me be a dink?’ That’s unpossible…instead of impossible.

He banged into the stable manager when she was taking him out of the field, and she fell into a stump. On her back. Cue a hospital visit and now she’s off horses/stable work for a good two weeks, maybe up to six now. I felt terrible when I heard about this.

Jesus. First, my horse is an asshole to jump. Now he is an asshole to handle?

I was SO OVER THE HORSE THING. All of it. All of it was putting me in a really bad mood. I felt so sorry for her, and like, just…GAHHH. Last week and hell, most of the ENTIRE month of May, my horse had no redeeming qualities. NONE.

I was furious at him, angry and so pissed off.

I rode Thursday and it was actually a fairly productive ride, but I found myself chasing him to the pole exercise I was working on…So maybe I wasn’t good at letting things go. By Saturday, I had a good long time to stew in my misery and unhappiness. When my lesson time finally rolled around, I had worked myself into a frenzy of tension. Full of ‘I don’t wannas.’

So yeah, perfect to have a lesson, right?

WRONG.

This time I verbalized what was going on in my head to my instructor, who totally got it. I’m going through some stuff right now with Oats, and I’m not feeling comfortable at all. I needed to take a step back and re-evaluate and see where things are.

And I am pleased to say I did not lose my temper at Oats in my lesson, we didn’t push my boundaries with jumps- we did a small ‘x’ and a small vertical that I quite frankly could jump in my sleep- and worked on jumping those in combination with a leg-yielding pattern. It was interesting, I was very sweaty when we finished, and I didn’t at all feel keyed up, nervous, anxious or anything.

Ending on a good note. I was pleased with how it went.

Sunday, I set up the pole exercise in the outdoor and went to practice my ‘eye’- short distance, long distance, right distance. I deliberately pushed for the long distance and actually was able to ride it- wow! And I ‘collected’ sort of held for a short distance, and was able to make it.

It was a good ride, very comprehensive. I had a small jump set up, but it wasn’t calling to me yesterday, so I left it alone. Our lateral work sucked, but what else is new? Haha. Oh and Oats had a hissy fit about a car parked behind the arena- something NEW?! Gasp! But we managed just fine.

I finished feeling pretty calm and competent. I need the practice, apparently, on making decisions. I will keep on it until I feel like I can make the right decision!

I also felt awful about the stable manager so I sent her a Starbucks gift card as a ‘get well’ gesture. That made me feel a tiny bit better.

No lessons, but still learning

Rescheduled my lesson from Thursday again to Saturday, due to coach time changes.

No prob, I thought I’d go early on Thursday, and see what kind of horse I had with me- well, I didn’t factor in that I was rudely interrupting Oats from his dinner (grabbed him to tack up before he had dinner and boy, he was pissed). He was antsy in the cross-ties, fidgety, snatchy and irritated.

When I went to ride, he was GOING PLACES.

I actually appreciate that on him, as most of our rides are me convincing him to get his pony butt in gear, but wow…He just kept on it. Our canter transition in the warm-up was a buck!

Not an obnoxious buck, a very enthusiastic one. He was like the Energizer Bunny of horses last night- going, going, going, going. I was getting tired?! We schooled over some (very low but fun) fences, trot a x-pole, canter the hay bales, canter the lattice jump, canter the x-pole and he was not tiring a single bit. Apparently angry Oats is energetic Oats?

I got tired of jumping and he was literally still raring to go. Need I remind you of how extremely unusual that is? His preferred movement is ‘stop.’ We worked on more canter, and then worked over tiny x-pole on a canter circle, both directions, starting with the left.

I know, me doing circle jumps on my own, voluntarily. Who is this person??

We switched to right, I wanted to try it at the trot and he would NOT trot. Only canter. Okay then…We cantered, and it was at times great, and other times, very awkward.

I then continued to work him at the trot, a bit of spiraling in and out – I know, it was A TON of work to ride him last night, just very physical- and he was okay but not really tuned into me at the trot.

We did some deep bend left and right, and big trot- he continued in big trot, which was surprising. He was much better at it on the right, which is not his good side.

I finally walked and even his walk was very motivated. I hopped off to cool him out, because by this point, he was so sweaty and needed a good long cool-down time.

I was tired! Wow! I do wish I had this kind of energy when I really need it- like during my jump lessons or in a horse show.