And Number One on the List of Things Not to Do with A Green Riding Stallion Is...

[dancinghorse]

...see a bit of electrobraid glommed onto the metal fence, reach out with whip (while riding stallion) to pop it loose, leaning just a little bit out of the saddle...

Owie.

Capria or ze keed wouldn't have budged--maybe stepped sideways a bit, that was all. I forgot I was riding Mr. Green As Grass, aka Mr. Hormone, aka The World's Most Hypersensitive Equine. Who was already In A Mood for the evening. He leaped sideways. I found myself hanging over air. He leaped back. I grabbed for the bucking strap.

Missed.

He took off bucking like a maniac. I stayed on for a while, saw it was a losing proposition, let go and bounced about fifty feet. Literally ate dirt. Scraped my arm up nicely. Have a huge bruise on my right hip. Am very glad I always wear my helmet when riding the boys. I may look like a mushroom, but I'm a safe fungus.

He was terribly upset and sure the forces of doom would come to annihilate him. He Lost His Human!

Took a while (after some time spent lying down, then sitting up, then limping around and making sure all the parts worked)(oh yeah, sprained thumb, too) to convince him it was OK, I was the world's stupidest human and it wasn't his fault.

Then I got back on and rode back and forth by the Scary Spot until he was sure it wasn't going to pop out at him again. And then he had to help me untack him and put the saddle away because I wasn't walking so well. By that time he had his equilibrium back. It's a terrible humiliation for a Lipizzan to lose his human.

Now I am sitting on a package of frozen peas, having taken a lot of Advil, and feeling like a complete dork.

On the up side, the boots made a nice difference to the steering and the half-halts, experiments in warp technology aside. And da Pook is untraumatized, as he didn't get blamed for me being stupid. (Fairness is a very big deal with Space Aliens.) I see some sacking out in his future--doing various weird things from the saddle, taking jackets off and on, and such. But I'll wait and do it when someone is there to grab him if he goes splooie. Also, will be prepared for said splooie-tude. Preparation is everything.

I didn't have any nerves at all about getting back on. As long as I'm not being an idiot, he's a very safe horse to ride. Just have to get him through the green bits. And not be a complete dork.

Comments

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

Oh, bless you. It fascinates me watching you take complete responsibility for the horse's behavior. I realize now that that's what the rider does. Thanks for the education.

You're welcome. It was entirely my fault. Admittedly he needs to learn not to wig when weird things happen on his back--a lesson he's had a hard time learning throughout his career--but it's my job to teach him. I ask him to suppress a lot of instincts in order to be a riding horse. The least I can do is think before I blow his tiny little brain out his ears.

I have to giggle at the thought of you having to reassure your stallion when what you really need to do was lie on the ground until the pain went away. It's a warm, sympathetic giggle, mind.

Uh, yeah. I would have loved to just lie there. But he was flying around in a fit of hysterics, I really didn't want him catching his foot in a rein and breaking his rather expensive bridle, and he needed to calm down, get his head back together, and not learn that he can shed his human whenever he doesn't like what she's asking.

He was fine for the remount. No fusses at all. I did some hopping around on his back--as much as I could with everything that hurt--and he understood what I was doing, so that was OK. We'll keep working on that. Some of the training they do for trail classes at gymkhanas would be a good idea. Get him used to odd things happening when he's being ridden--and teach him not to take off bucking like a maniac when he doesn't like them.

[whitezinnia.livejournal.com]

Justwanted to say that it's the Real Riders who never blame the horse. One of the best things I ever learned from a jumper trainer, long ago, was that it's the rider's fault for hitting the dirt, 99% of the time. "You weren't prepared, you weren't thinking, your seat wasn't secure enough!" was what I heard when I ate arena time and again. Bill had lots of faults, but on this topic he was spot-on.

My Sammy, bless his big Lipizzan honker, does what he's designed to do. If I can't deal, it's my problem, not his.

I'm glad you had those frozen peas available. I think that's one of a rider's esential bits of equipment.