With the 2020 show season officially in my rearview, it’s time to maximize the next few months before we head to Florida. We are still heading to Florida, even with the world’s many unknowns, because while showing is lovely and fun, my team and I really go down to train in the nice weather and to be close to my coach, so I can get more help with my herd. If we actually get to show, then great. But the training is the key.

Fortunately, all three of the 9-year-olds in my life are in a place where the training is really important right now. For Gretzky, aka Puck, he’s ready for his Prix St. Georges debut, and for Elvis, he’s pretty darn close to having the passage, piaffe and transitions between them that could take us down centerline at Intermediaire II. That means my time is being spent making them both a lot stronger for collection.

This is where it’s nice to be at home, specifically my home. My farm sits on 135 acres of rolling hills, and this year we’ve had a perfect autumn with the right amount of rain to make the ground fantastic. So I’m working out of the ring at least two days a week. For Puck, canter pirouettes on a hillside are giving him a lot of balance and a lot of coordination, and for Elvis, piaffe down a hill is helping with engagement. Any hill work is fatiguing, of course, so I’m careful about watching the amount of time that we spend working, and I give lots of breaks to help keep injury at bay. But it’s been extremely helpful already.

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Hey, guess what? It’s been a weird year. Shocking, I know.

I had a plan—getting Elvis to the U.S. Dressage Festival of Champions—only to have it rerouted by COVID-19, amongst other things. But I also had a few plans for the other horses in my life: trying to qualify as many as possible for the USDF Finals. And then those were canceled.

I must confess that I did not shed a tear for the USDF Finals. For sure it’s one of my favorite shows, run by a crack team and with a very “Big Deal” feeling. I’ll miss not being there, but not nearly as much as I’d be anxious and scared, knowing it wasn’t fair when so many couldn’t be there, knowing what a dangerous and irresponsible proposition such a big gathering of people, largely indoors, from all over the country, would be.

And not for nothing, but being done a month earlier wasn’t breaking my heart. Every horse in my life is developing, not finished. I want to see them rise to their potential, and I want to do it smart, letting my horses have downtime when I can. So being done competitively by mid-October instead of mid-November? A silver lining I’m perfectly happy with.

So it meant that the Region 1 Championships were our year-ender. I’d qualified Puck (Gretzky RV) for the third level championships and Patrick—Terrina Baker’s De Angelicus MTF—for the first level championships when we were in Florida. Helio earned his fourth level and Prix St. Georges qualifying scores over the summer. And off we went.

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Horses like Elvis, and like Ellegria, and Dorian Gray, and Fiero, are unbelievably wonderful to train. They have their hiccups and misunderstandings along the way, but they’re generous of heart and mind, and talented of body and limb; they soak up the education presented to them like a sponge, and they make their way up the levels, and that’s that. It’s hard. Of course it’s hard. But it’s relatively linear. On a gifted and kind horse, you rarely despair. It’s great fun. I highly recommend it.

Then there are the Pucks. The Midges. The Fenders. The ones whose bodies, or minds, or both, aren’t always on your side. The ones who, at least for a time, do not care who you are, or what your credentials are, or how fair or methodical or correct you are; they do what they want. And what they want is absolutely, unequivocally NOT what you want.

Getting those ding dongs on your side is time consuming, exhausting, occasionally scary, and will fill you with doubt. There are times where it is sheer misery. And I freaking love it.

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A few years ago, in the midst of a spat with disaster-fatigue-induced depression, I had the word “grit” tattooed on my left wrist. I adore it, I adore the meaning behind it, and I look at it often for comfort.

I don’t think it would surprise anyone to hear that I’ve needed a little grit lately, because I think we all have. This is one of those times where a whole lot of awfulness is beyond our control, and we’re just going to have to bear it a while. And I know I’m not alone when I say that I’m just freaking tired of it. It’s exhausting. And since I’m not a molecular scientist, and since I already wear my mask and don’t go anywhere, and since I’m already registered to vote, there’s no action I can personally take to make any of this take less long. So I’m at my limit.

Read the rest at The Chronicle of the Horse.

I don’t believe in editing my work. Or second drafts. If you’re reading a blog of mine, there’s an overwhelming possibility that it was a one-hit-wonder, something I banged out in one sitting, ran quickly through spell check, and sent off to my editors. Boom, done. But I’ve written and rewritten this blog about five times now. Is it because goodbyes are so hard, and there’s so much I want to say about my amazing friend, Beverley Thomas? Maybe. But mostly it’s because I’m still not ready. I thought we’d have so, so much more time.

In 2013, I received an email from a woman about training for her horse. She said she was older, had bought a young horse, and that her current trainer was doing the lion’s share of the riding, but she wanted to ride the horse more herself. I was braced for disaster, but the horse was a treasure, one of the best-tempered animals I’ve ever encountered. And the lady was perfectly capable of riding him. So into my program came a horse named Fiero, and his owner, Beverley Thomas. It was the beginning of a friendship the likes of which I’ve rarely known, and one I figured would carry on until time stood still.

But two weeks ago, after not hearing from Bev in two days, we drove to her home to check on her and found her unconscious. She passed away last Thursday. It’s just impossible to believe that this bright, ferocious force of a person is gone. But she’s gone.

Read the rest at The Chronicle of the Horse.