The Dressage Foundation was kind enough to honor me with a Major Lindgren Instructor Education grant to allow me to ride with Olympic bronze medalist and living legend Mike Poulin. I have a fair bit of experience bringing lunatics up the levels, but I don’t have a lot of mileage doing it with more reasonable horses, and as I currently have two polite animals in my life—Elvis and Swagger—as well as a bunch of students on young horses that aren’t wild things, I was excited to expand my toolbox with Mike this winter, adding new tips and tricks I can use to help my students develop their FEI horses more wisely.

Annoyingly, the schedule this winter has had other plans. Mike’s travel schedule seemed to only accommodate weeks that Elvis was at a CDI—not the time to be talking about piaffe strategy, which is my primary focus on him for the year once we’re done showing. The handful of other times we’ve been able to make it work, it’s rained. But I’ve finally gotten in a few lessons, on all of my horses, and I’ve learned a ton.

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We’re halfway through our Florida season, and while I certainly don’t have NOTHING to show for it, I also feel like this season is creeeeeeeping by. I’m sure part of that feeling is that we came two weeks earlier than we normally do and are staying two weeks later, so there’s a whole ‘nother month to fill down here.

But I also think that, as my first horse show was such a hot mess, it really just took the wind out of my sails. Fortunately, I redeemed myself at my second outing; I still haven’t had THE SHOW I want to have, but at least I’m making some progress, and I’m learning something (if not some things!) every outing.

For this show, I over-prepared. After Elvis was uncharacteristically wild at Show 1 (truly, he’s a horse who’s never been naughty for longer than five seconds in our entire relationship, and he was OUT OF HIS MIND), I spent a ton of money and time and stress ruling out physical causes. He’s sound as a pound, his tummy looks good, and all my equipment fits beautifully. So then I rode him, and I worked him, and I went for it. Lastly, I arrived at the show a day earlier, to make sure I had plenty of time to school him in the show arena in case he had impure thoughts.

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I just lived through one of those disaster weeks.

It started with the USDF FEI Trainers’ Conference. I’d been selected to ride on Elvis, and I thought it would be a good exposure moment for him as I work to add members to his syndicate. But I’d also entered a CDI for later in the week, and when we started playing with some big changes to my warm-up routine in the clinic on Monday, I realized I needed a new plan. (A clinic can be a wonderful opportunity to try something new, but I know from experience that making major changes right before you show seldom works out.)

They graciously let me sub in my mom’s wonderful Lusitano, Helio, who is 9 and very much still developing. We spent the first half hour talking about his self-carriage, notably his tendency to be a bit too round, and the challenges of how to address that issue. I was very proud of the little guy for stepping up so beautifully, and I posted a quick clip of him working the canter with Olympian Ashley Holzer, only to have the Klassikal Kowboys of Facebook™ get a hold of it and send it viral because—gasp!—there were moments in time where he was imperfect in the contact.

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Greetings from Florida, where my team is safely ensconced. We had a boring drive down—my favorite kind—and the horses arrived safely. We’re all settled in, we’re riding, we’re working, we’re juggling the holidays and the persistent rain days, and we’re absolutely ready to go… but don’t really have anywhere to go.

This is my longest Floridian winter: four months, as opposed to our usual three. My clients wanted to stay longer, so we’re staying longer. It meant we got here before Christmas, so by the time the horses were settled in, it was holiday-palooza, so they had an inconsistent work schedule all of last week. But everyone feels good, and the plan for the season is coming together.

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And that was that. Seven weeks went by, and my hand healed. The pins came out on Tuesday afternoon, I rode Elvis—the one of my animals I trust not to be strong or feral or both—Wednesday morning. Farm holiday party Thursday morning, followed by packing-palooza Thursday afternoon. “Christmas” dinner with my partner and his kids Friday night. And then hopping in my truck with most of my stuff and the best dog ever for the two-day drive to Welly-world.

I can’t say that the time has “flown by.” It’s been tedious and frustrating. My hand hurt, a lot, for a long time. I felt like a baby for not be

ing able to push through; forget wanting to ride, I just wanted to be able to do ANYTHING, and any activity that got my heart rate up was a no-no, because of the pain and the swelling. So my very fit and trim, eating great and riding five to six horses a day and going to the gym four days a week self, had to be basically sedentary for the duration of my healing. I’m heading to Florida with a body that feels like a ton of bricks; a right hand that, while liberated from the pins, is stiff as hell and filled with awe-inspiring swelling; and more than a little frustration.

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Whenever I go through a crisis, I always ask myself, “What can I learn from this experience? What can I do better?”

I’ve learned a few things from my recent broken hand experience: that horses are silly, that hands are fragile, that appropriate pain medication is wonderful, and that good people are even better.

But I’ve also learned a lot about health care, and how phenomenally expensive it is in the United States. This is not new information to me, but I’ve been so fortunate as to not really have anything go exceptionally wrong in my adult life as far as my health is concerned. As a self-employed person, I get my health insurance through the ACA exchange, and I have an extremely high deductible. But since I rarely see a doctor more than twice a year, just for routine care, I hadn’t really given it a thought.

And then this: The surgery to insert two (removable, thank goodness) pins from my hand cost me more than $3,000, cash upfront. The bills have not yet begun to roll in for all of the other visits with specialists, therapists and follow-ups, but I can’t even begin to imagine. I’m sure that they will get close to, but not actually touch my massive deductible. Which means I’m on the hook for the whole hog.

This could have been a phenomenal strain on my resources, something I’d be paying off for a while. And I’m lucky that this is such a minor thing: What if I had done my pelvis, or my spine, or my brain? What if I’d required an ambulance ride or a hospital stay?

But I have something called a Health Savings Account, or HSA, and I think that everyone should have one, especially all of my wonderful 20-something horse girls who should start saving right now, because the reality is that in this business, it’s only a matter of time.

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In my center desk drawer in my office at the farm, I keep a rejection letter from The Dressage Foundation. It was from the first time that I’d applied for the Carol Lavell Prize, and it went to two other people that year. I keep it because of the handwritten note from Carol herself on the letter: “High performance means never give up, never give in.” I’ve applied for her grant three times, and for other grants ranging from small to $25,000 at least 10 times at this point, and I have yet to receive one.

I celebrate each rejection.

Not because I wouldn’t like the money. Of course I would; it would be awfully nice to get a little help in this expensive sport. But each time I am told no, each time I am told that I am not good enough, that I lack the qualities they’re looking for, it only strengthens my resolve to prove them wrong.

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While my broken hand changed my plans regarding the U.S. Dressage Finals, it did not cancel them, because I had two students qualified in the amateur and open Grand Prix divisions. And when you have students at that level, you go, broken or not!

In addition to being exceptionally good riders on wonderful horses, Abe Pugh and Jenn Drescher are also some of my favorite humans, and getting to spend time with them is always a pleasure. And my favorite thing about big shows like national championships is that everyone from all over the country gets together in one place, so it’s an efficient way to see friends from everywhere and catch up.

The finals are just a splendid horse show. They get to pull from all of the A teams from show management and volunteer crews around the country: the best show secretaries, the best ring stewards, the best technical delegates, the best press corps and media coverage, the best of everything. It means the show runs like a well oiled machine, and that is always a joy.

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