February 2008 • VOLUME 30 • © HORSES For LIFE™ Magazine

Riding By Torchlight
February 2008

A funny thing happens when you buy a horse. First of all, people have all kinds of reasons for doing so. They usually go something like this –

• Horses are therapy (and more fun/warm/loving/fuzzy than an hour on the couch).
• They give me a sense of freedom.
• I saw My Friend Flicka and realized I couldn’t live another day without horses.
• They provide good exercise out in the open air.
• I enjoy the relationship and the connection to nature.
• I was looking for a new hobby and this looked like fun, and less money than a speedboat (or so I thought)
• I grew up riding and can’t imagine a day without horses.
• I bought a horse for my daughter to keep her out of trouble. Now I am riding the horse and she is taking piano lessons. Or is it singing lessons? ..or..bellydancing…no, computer lessons. No, that was last month. Piano lessons.
• They are so pretty I just had to have one, and I really like the whole top-hat and coattails look.
• I always wanted a pony and now I can finally have my own (40 years, 18 inches and 50 lbs later and usually in the form of a 4 year old, 13hh barely halterbroke Arab stud. Doesn’t he look JUST like the Black Stallion?).

Of course there are plenty more reasons, of all sorts, but in my personal experience, never has anyone – including me - listed: :

• “I am looking for life lessons from an extraordinary companion.”

But the funny thing that happens is, that’s exactly what you get. Life lessons in a really cute and sometimes even magnificent package. Now whether or not people decide to accept and work with this part of the package is entirely up to them. It’s kind of like the whole Mission Impossible thing – should you choose to accept this mission and so on. Except in the movies they always accept, and in real life horses get a very mixed set of responses. Oh, and this package generally does not self destruct in 10 seconds whether you accept or not, although I know people who might argue with that. And they have the vet bills to back it up. But I digress.

Some people do choose not to accept that offer. I have known people that have been in the horse business for decades, their entire lives, who still maintain that horses are slow, dimwitted, stupid animals that don’t actually feel pain, and have no wisdom of their own to impart.

One renowned trainer I had the uneven pleasure of working around for several years, took every opportunity to tell me

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