Today's ride wasn't really romantic, except in the way that joining with a horse to dance, and especially with a majestic Friesian mare, is always romantic. It took two tries to canter left lead both times I picked it up. But once we got it, it wasn't bad -- hard to hold down the long side and through the entire circle that the test will require, but nicer as a canter, more responsive to my inside leg and not falling in, etc. Right lead wasn't a problem, and wanting to jig after the canter was only a bit of a problem. Trot was mostly nice and we had some very lovely transitions. Still don't have the head and acceptance of bit as steady as I would like. Situpsitupsitback. I think I want my mistakes this show to be forward mistakes, powerful mistakes. Let's be relaxed but powerful, and not strive for perfection on the letters. Sometimes there's just so much to think about at once -- straight? bent? round? forward? rhythmic? relaxed? -- and there is no doing them one at a time, it is all of it and still correcting one at a time too. Sorta like family: All for One; One for All.
I did ride most of the test today for practice and found it hard to both ride the current movement and prepare for the one coming up. Stay in the here and now because she doesn't need all that much preparation -- as I said to Lisa the other day, Rol only needs ready set go, not ready, set, ready, set, ready set go. It was super nice that the scary end went away (the trees got removed). Now we'll only have the judges stand to make that end difficult.
Ah, but when I got to the barn, Sage and Shawna were in the arena and I hadn't gotten out of the van when Shawna said, "Hey, I promised you a ride while he was here! You want to ride him now?" H*ll yeah. Lynlee laughed at how hard it was to convince me of that. Oh my, but Sage is a small horse. Not really but compared to what I've been riding, his body is very thin . . . and I must say easy to sit on. That was just nice. I probably didn't ride him all that well but I didn't feel to badly about it. He was fun. It would be a lot of fun to learn how to ride him. Then Shawna rode Bart so it was sort of round robin horse day which I think is really very helpful to everyone involved and wish we did more of it.
Rol got a bath after the ride. She's suddenly shedding big time. I haven't practiced braiding at all. Etc. Everything must be cleaned, polished. I love every speck of it. White breeches, I hope you are still white! Can I find the boot polish? One week.
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