Remote Workday Musings

Wednesday morning I had a meeting that I was "in charge of" and so didn't have much time to do anything significant with TC. So I put him on the long lines for the first time in a while (in the outdoor round pen which was open until it rained yesterday).

I always feel like long lining might be boring to him, but he's ALL about it, mostly because I usually use the clicker. He seemed very eager to do his work, but not to bring his back up and track up. We were going left and when we switched right, he was definitely a bit sticky on the outside hind leg. So his left butt cheek was definitely sore from the day before, when he spooked at a chair every time we went by it so he had to canter by it a lot, and probably in a more collected canter than he's used to.

This used to be par for the course for this horse. I think the first six months after he came home from rehab he was kind of NQR every other day. He just got sore. After I put him on the MuscleUp supplement, and after he got older I'm sure, he stopped getting sore. So luckily I didn't freak out about it. And he was totally sound and normal on Thursday morning.

The fog was so ominous, but it was sunny at the barn

On Wednesday evening, I had talked to my unofficial boss (who really should be my official boss, this school is so weird) who has been very encouraging about me working from home once a week. It REALLY saves me on commute time and how many miles I'm putting on my car. I get a bit annoyed when I have no meetings scheduled and I end up just sitting at my desk all day and talk to no one. I get even more annoyed on days like Wednesday where I was trying to work on my presentation and it seemed like my desk was the place to be for everyone and their mother. So working from home is really nice.

My official boss is less enthused about it. Part of me doesn't care all that much. But I do have to get it "approved" so I sent an email on Thursday morning and she got back to me with what I considered to be a tiny bit of attitude about it. Dude, do you know what it's like to drive 3 hours a day every day? It is not fun. It was still approved, but I was a little bit annoyed. So poor TC had to work harder than normal because of it. And that got me thinking.

I've been considering what my future with him will be lately. I'm thinking a lot about the future. I had my life get turned upside down when my plans to move across the country fell through. For a second I had NO IDEA what to do with my life and kind of freaked out. But I'm a planner and relish in the act of planning, so I'm feeling as good as I've ever felt about the future.

So things may be changing in my personal life, but I do want to see some changes happening in my life with TC. The last few years have been a period of catching up financially. Putting money into retirement accounts that I hadn't been able to, saving a hefty emergency fund and extra money for what I was going to use for moving costs (instead that's just more emergency fund at the moment). Every single financial decision I make is heavily weighed and I stick to a very strict budget.

After he was bad the other day, he didn't think it
was unwarranted 

This means that I rarely take lessons. And at first it was totally fine. TC was too young to be in that hard of work, he was then injured, and I've taken so many horses beyond where he's at that I don't *need* lessons on him. But I WANT to take lessons.

I took maybe five or six lessons in the last year and I think this year I want to get a bit more serious about my education with this horse. I feel bad for him on days like Thursday when he had to work hard and we had a few minor disagreements (you can't prop your butt up in a walk to canter transition, leg yields from the wall DO exist and you can't stick your head up in the air and slow down to do them, you can't just run away from my outside leg at the canter). I know he needs to work hard, but it's nice having someone confirm that this is the way he SHOULD be working hard.

That may sound really confusing since I've trained horses to the FEI levels myself where I was the one who was making all the decisions. But I don't want to take TC on the path that I know. Because I want TC to be better than any horse I've trained before. And that means having someone guide me through the process a bit more regularly. Maybe not once a week, since there are no trainers who come to my barn (that I'm willing to ride with) so that means hauling out, but maybe every other weekend. This probably won't start until at least February, I'm doing the Mary Wanless workshop in a week (!!!) so that ate all my would-be lesson budget for January.

Wandering around the ranch

My next problem is finding a trainer to ride with. My first instinct is to ride with my actual trainer. She's the best trainer in the area, she gets his type, she isn't scared of him (despite knowing his behavioral problems which IMO are rapidly disappearing), she is fair to him, he likes her barn, I am not totally useless turning the trailer around there, etc. Money-wise she's not outrageously expensive.

But there are some downsides, I've had trouble with my own confidence riding with her because she knew me on Rico and likes to compare current me to past me (and kind of ignores me when I'm like dude, I used to pretty much be brought to you by Crossfit and now I'm brought to you by sitting on my ass for 10 hours a day). I also struggle because she has trouble being on time, and hauling over there, taking a lesson, and hauling back is already a 3.5 hour journey, then add in having to wait around... and it really digs into my weekend.

I audited a trainer recently who is really nearby (like take 3.5 hours down to 2). She has her Gold (but has only competed at GP on one horse and hasn't taken anyone to GP) and she's super nice. But I can only describe her lessons as... dressage porn. She told the rider what to do, and then praised them for it. So like instructions were to go down the long side, do a circle, ride a leg yield. And then more positive reinforcement than I'm used to (yah, that's nice, good job, yes!, that's it, praise him). Sometimes there'd be something helpful like having the rider bend the horse more or do a transition again if it wasn't good. But I'm used to a constant stream of intense theory and instruction. And this just seemed like the kind of trainer I'd argue with over something like over-bending. I do not like over-bending.

There are others in the area. Obviously the trainer who actually got me my Gold is around, but she's a bit more crank and spank than TC needs (he needs 0 crank and spanks). There's two other trainers who are close-ish, one I haven't even heard anything about and one Kate has ridden with and no longer rides with (in favor of Tracey). Soooo I feel a bit stuck. In an area surrounded by Gold Medalists, you'd think I could find someone easily!

At least I know that my trainer's track record is good!

My whole life may move soon anyway, I have some job applications out in a few different places, so I don't really need to solve this problem any time soon. But I think just reworking my budget and getting two lessons scheduled in February (unless it pours rain, both TC and I hate rain) would be a good start!