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The first horse I ever sat on was an old chestnut lesson horse named Trinket. How I loved riding Trinket. She was lazy, slow, and push-button for beginners. I had my first lope on her on accident when I six and was supposed to be posting to the trot, and that was the moment I fell in love with horses forever. When I was ten or eleven, Trinket colicked early one morning and the damage was irreparable. She was put down, and had the biggest horse funeral I have ever seen. Riders from other states flew in to pay their dues and say goodbye to a horse who taught them so much. I can't believe how many people Trinket taught how to ride, and how many people she touched on the way, even me. I wish I had a picture of her, but I can't seem to find one.
There were a lot of horses in between Trinket and Otto, but Otto (pronounce Oat-oh) was next on the list of horses that changed my life. Otto was the first horse I ever leased, and I remember the exchange of words with my barn owner in her office. I wanted to lease this horse named Linkers and I remember asking over and over, "Kathy, can I lease Linkers? I wanna ride Linkers, how come I can't ride Linkers?" and her reply was simple and non-arguable by a twelve year old, "Eryn, you can't lease Linkers because Linkers is a boy's horse." I had no idea what to say to that, so we decided I would lease Otto; a big, tall, appendix/ paint gelding with soft eyes and an even softer heart. Otto really taught me everything I needed to know about horses including how to get on bareback without flinging myself over his back and onto the ground on the other side, and how to hang on when a horse bolts. He also carried me through my first horse show (we got a 5th place in the bareback class and didn't place through the rest of the day), and let me spend hours brushing him and loving on him. Otto is dead now too, and I miss him. I know I have a picture of Otto here somewhere. I can't find it in our messy closet but I'll keep looking.
I changed trainers after I rode Otto, and switched to the western pleasure trainer at my barn. All of her horses were push-button and fun to ride, and pleasure was such a switch in learning for me. Instead of tearing ass around bareback on a huge, crazy gelding, I was expected to learn how to ride for equitation and for pleasure, and spent a lot of time with a whip tucked in my elbows and across my back. With my pleasure trainer, I learned how to look pretty and how to remain confident and cool in the show pen. I can't remember the registered name of the horse I used to ride for her, but her barn name was Corey and that horse was a nightmare. When she was done working, she would just stop in the middle of the arena and buck, or drift in toward the rail and try to cut the other way. That horse was the source of many tears, troubles, trials and tribulations and I'll never forget her because she taught me to problem solve. I'm surprised I can't find pictures of any of these horses - I took a TON of pictures as a kid. Hm.
My parents finally bought me my first horse. He was an ugly, scraggly arabian gelding named Flash, whose previous owners had not taken incredible care of. He was 200lbs underweight and had a dull, sticky coat. He was 15 and I was 13, and I loved the ever living shit out of him. He was my best friend and also my largest rival, but once we worked through our frustration with each other, he was the best horse I ever had. His story is here: http://vehemently.wordpress.com/2011/06/21/flash/
I have thousands of pictures of Flash, but I'll cut it down to three:
I have since lost track of where Flash is at, but last I checked, he was owned by a family and still being shown over fences. If my math is right, he would be 26.
While I had Flash, my best friend Stacey bought an older, chocolate bay ex-roper named Buddy, and he was an amazing trail horse. We scoured old dirt roads and fields together, and Stacey eventually put Buddy into a dressage program. At some point, she fell off of him, and was afraid to get back on (and also afraid to tell her mom), so I took lessons on him with her trainer until Stacey got her groove back. It took almost a year.
I don't have a lot of pictures of Buddy, but he is still alive and well and lives at a barn near Stacey's house in Corvallis, Oregon. He is close to me, too, which is awesome. It's fun to go ride him sometimes and re-live ten years ago.
The last horse I loved from the very first barn I rode at was this little 13.3 hand arab gelding named Roy. I imagine he is dead now, as I rode him for his owner when I was about 17, and he was already ancient, but you never know. His mom let me use him for punk rock riding lessons (which is a whole other blog entry) and for fun time play time whenever I wanted. Roy was a turd, but I loved him effortlessly. He was not very well trained and had steering, stopping and going issues, but I dealt with all of those things and he ended up being super once we moved past them. I used him once for a punk rock riding lesson where we were learning how to fall properly, and my best friend Jewel took a face plant off of Roy that we still talk about today. He just stopped when she fell and looked at her like, "How you get there, blue hair girl?" He was very small and very sweet. I took pictures of him one day before his owner moved him to another city, and I don't know what happened to him after that. You can see Buddy in the background, there. It's a picture of a picture, obviously.
After Roy, I had Tyke, who I wrote about this morning: here. I'll throw another picture up of him though, because he is cute.
Part Two will chronicle all of the horses that I have loved in some way from the beginning of my adulthood to now (and I have pictures of every single one of them). It will be magical. Stay tuned!
