Me - In the Saddle! Part 3

This is the final blog entry of photos of me riding. (Although you never know what I might come across as I clean out the closet where I have stored my old photos and albums!) 

 This is my sister's horse, Thor. A lovely Appaloosa, she owned him back in the 1980s and 1990s.

I really do not remember much about him. Leslie got him after I had moved to Illinois, and while I would see him occasionally when we came back to Indiana to visit family, usually there was so much to do (Craig's family as well as mine were in the same town), a barn visit out in the country was difficult to squeeze in.

This photo has been in the blog before, but I could not leave out one of me with my beloved Amy. This is from 1971 and we are at our very first horse show together. 

 It's funny how old photos can document how things have changed over time. See how I have a light connection with both Amy's and Thor's mouths? Nowadays, western pleasure horses are shown with very, very loose reins. I remember attending a 4-H clinic as a teen and a boy was riding with very loose reins like you see on today's western horses.

Photo from Google Images.

The clinician stopped us all and talked about how we should always maintain light contact with our horses' mouths, especially in case of emergency. He asked the boy with the loose reins to walk his horse around the ring and then suddenly called, "Stop!" The rider had to pull the reins up to his chest, leaning way back in the saddle before making contact with his horse's mouth for the stop.

That lesson was deeply ingrained in me and I still remember it all these years later. If I were back in the saddle again, no doubt I would maintain that light contact that I learned was an important safety feature of being on horseback.

This next photo isn't one of me in the saddle, but it is a picture of Indy with his best friend, Sweetzer.

(Wow, just look at that Illinois prairie, stretching away in the distance! So beautiful!)

Sweetzer belonged to my dear friend, Linda, and the two horses were always together - their stalls were adjacent to one another, they were turned out together, and Linda and I rode them together frequently.

In fact, I have this print by J. F. Herring, "Stable Companions," hanging in my office because it reminds me so much of Indy and Sweetzer. The two were often in a similar pose - heads hanging over the fence or stall doors, Indy's head lifted over Sweetzer's neck. 

All these look-backs at me in the saddle have evoked a deep sense of nostalgia and gotten me to wondering if my riding days really are over. After all, my friends Merja and Lyn still ride, and both of them are about my age. But it's not really an age factor that keeps me on the ground. I'm tentatively scheduled for more surgery in January and then possibly another partial spinal fusion next year. Maybe after that is completed I will feel up to hopping back into the saddle. 

Boy, wouldn't Abby be surprised!!