Sunday, September 20

Today I am grateful for:

Another really nice day. Very sunny, and around 20 C.

Seeing a riding facility today that I really like.

Cons: It doesn't have a full indoor arena. Really it's more like three seasons. I know I will really miss that, and I'm not sure how bad it's going to be, just using a small covered round pen that isn't properly a full arena. They don't, as of yet, have a dressage coach. They don't have room for everyone's tack, so you'd have to take your saddle back and forth with you. Annoying but doable.

Pros: They do have very good paddocks, with good fencing, and no mud, no manure build up, proper automatic waterers, and a run in shed. The yard isn't muddy, it's all grass or gravel. They have a proper hay shed, so the hay won't get moldy. The hay is very good, and she actually gets it tested for carbohydrate and protein levels, and she does feed it loose (so it's not like a round bale where they stand and bury their heads in it all day). They have a good outdoor arena which would be usable for about 6 months out of the year, if it's a good year. The owner is there almost all the time, and she too believes that people should not ride alone, and wants people to check in with her when they ride for safety. There are lessons available, more along the line of biomechanics and liberty work, which might be interesting and useful and can still be incorporated into dressage. She's open to me bringing in a dressage coach if/when I find one. She drives a pony with a cart, and I want to learn everything I can from her about driving, and I might even bring my ponies to her place to work with them for a while because my goal is to teach them both to drive. The facility is not far to drive, is easy to get to, and the board fees are reasonable, especially considering how much more she's paying for the very good hay.

Not sure yet: The owner is VERY focused on the health of the horse, but that can be taken a little too far too, believe it or not. While I truly want to have a healthy horse, I am a little worried that this will be the kind of person who insists on me doing a lot of supplements, or woo-woo treatments like "running energy" on my horse, or constantly telling me I need a new bit, or a new saddle, or to keep doing blood work on my horse to look for deficiencies. I know I'll have to go along with this a bit, especially at first, because she seems strongly into the idea of doing health assessments with new horses. It can really run into a lot of money though, if it gets to be something she insists we have to do a lot. Or, it can mean a lot of not really getting to ride my horse if she deems he's not fit enough for work. Remains to be seen, and no way of knowing if this will be good or overwhelming until I try it.

I already understand that anywhere I go, I'm likely only going to get 90% of what I want at best. No one gets everything. Where I am at right now, I feel like I can't move forward if River isn't breathing well, and it doesn't matter if there's a perfect indoor arena if I can't ride my horse.

What I like about the owner of the place I saw today, is that she is very open, would definitely understand ANY concerns I had about my horse's well-being and very much seems like the kind of person willing to keep trying to find solutions. She believes in trying to rehabilitate horses with health issues, believes that a lot of issues with horses are management issues and can be addressed through changes in diet and exercise and better hoof care. She's less interested in just socking them full of pain killers and making them work anyhow.

So, I think that this is the place for us. I know I will miss having a proper full indoor arena, but at the same time, is that any different from the fact that at the current barn, I end up not being able to ride River for about two months every year from various health problems?

I also have to remind myself that if I don't like it, I can still look around for something else. The other barn that I liked will still be there too. I can try this, and give it a fair trial, and if nothing else, I know that this person has a lot of knowledge that I can use, such as the driving skills. She won't be WORSE for River than where we are right now.

Possible opportunity: While I was trying to find this barn, I first drove into the yard of a place very close to it. A woman came to the gate and talked to me for a while, and she is actually very much into dressage, is on the board for some local horse organizations, has a full indoor arena that she actually said maybe I could come and use (she lives very close to the other place), she rides at a level 3 dressage (very good) and has her own coach! She right away gave me her phone number, and invited me to come see her lessons next Sunday, and she even mentioned that at some point she might consider boarding at her place if she had room. I really don't know how serious all of her very generous offers are, but you know, if this woman is everything she seemed to be in our short acquaintance, she just seems like someone who really loves riding and wants to share a bit of her good fortune in owning a nice arena. It would be totally possible for me to consider boarding at the place that doesn't have an indoor arena, and occasionally trailering over to her place to use her arena for lessons, because she is less than a mile away from the boarding facility. If nothing else, I have a chance to maybe make a friend, and to learn something from her lessons. She would also have a lot of connections, and that could be good too. If nothing comes of it, oh well. It's an opportunity.

That was most of my day today. I came home, and vegged out in front of the computer mostly.

I did call my Mom, and had a decent conversation with her. I find it a little sad that she has so little to add to the conversations any more, because most of her life now consists of just sitting in her chair napping and listening to music. Since she was in the hospital earlier this year, she can't seem to mentally focus enough to enjoy reading anymore, and that was a great passion for her.

It does remind me of when I helped look after a friend's Mom, years ago. She too, was about 90, though she had dementia and my Mom isn't quite there, but her life was mostly limited to looking out the window and talking about what she could see. We would look at the birds that came to the feeder, admire the sunshine if it was nice, or comment on the wind and the clouds if it was stormy. Talked about the leaves on the trees, or if there were flowers. Whatever was in the absolute present moment. There was a lesson, there.

I tell my Mom about my day a bit, and I'm not always sure if she follows when I talk about working on the house or the yard. She makes the right noises. Only a few years ago she would have been more curious and might have told more stories about building things too, but lately she just sort of listens. She doesn't even have much to say anymore about my sisters, only that she doesn't seem to hear much from them. My brother and his wife and their son seem to be the only people talking to her much, and my trainwreck sister. Either that, or Mom doesn't really remember whether or not she talked to anyone else.

Anyhow, I'm grateful to still be able to talk to her.