The Right Horse

For the 25+ years I’ve been involved in horses, my mantra had been “Never give up.”

There’s always a way. Find a different job for the horse. Let him tell you what he wants to be. I cringed at the social media posts that suggested that the answer to problems was getting a different horse.

Then I became something I’d never been before—70.

Age has changed everything my stubborn soul believed about horses, humility, and the fine line between persistence and self-deception.

I began riding in my 40s. For whatever reason in my admittedly flawed personality, once I became comfortable sitting the motion of a horse, I developed a penchant for riding horses that others feared.

I got away with it for quite a while. I had a decent seat and the naive notion that all horses would become cooperative with enough courage, patience and consistency.

In the mid 2000s I acquired an OTTB mare, Lola, at auction through misleading circumstances. It was ultimately revealed that she was only two weeks off the track, and had been pulled up in a race due to an injury and drugged to mask her symptoms.

It was quite a setback. But I whispered in her ear that I would never give up on her, and I meant it.

It took almost a year to rehab her from her injury.

The thing is, Lola was one of those exceptional mares that completely bonded with me during the rehab process. She cooperated to the best of her ability with anything that I asked of her and needed my complete support in everything new she attempted as we started retraining her as a riding horse.

In that way, she made me a much better and more aware rider. The partnership was so easy-going that I attributed that success to my acumen as a rider.

It wasn’t. It was 99% her.

Lola set me up to believe that I could seemingly do anything with any horse.

Then I turned 70, not fully the same rider I had been when Lola came along—still capable, but with less balance and more health issues—and I acquired another young OTTB mare.

Molly was a much different horse than Lola. She was sharp and spirited and required a stronger rider than the one I had aged into being. A few unintended dismounts had driven that point home. I soon found myself creating reasons to avoid riding her.

That shift became poignantly clear on a trip to Ireland—probably my favorite place in the world to ride a horse—when I was paired with an Irish cob named Prata.

Prata was the epitome of a cooperative and dependable mount. I felt something trotting in the magnificent landscapes of the Dingle Peninsula on him that I hadn’t in two years—I was instantly comfortable! I didn’t feel like I was sitting on a keg of dynamite, knowing the fuse had been lit. I was able to relax on a horse.

I found myself pondering the thought that Prata was exactly the kind of horse I needed at this point in my riding life.

But I couldn’t allow myself to “give up” on Molly because… I just couldn’t. It felt like I was admitting defeat. Like I was a lesser rider. My ego was writing checks my aging body couldn’t cash.

When I returned home, my daughter Sam, an accomplished rider herself, asked me to come with her to evaluate a draft cross mare named Siobhan for some of our less experienced friends to ride.

Sam knew exactly what she was doing.

I was immediately drawn to Siobhan. Much like the gelding I had ridden in Ireland, in appearance and disposition, she was a real steady-Eddie type. I felt completely safe and in tune with her. I cantered on her so naturally, I forgot it had been two years since I last cantered a horse.

Siobhan came home with me late summer of last year and has reignited my love of riding. But she gave me another unexpected gift too.

Siobhan’s former owner came to our barn the day we shipped her and her daughter, a delightful and very capable junior hunter-jumper rider, met and fell in love with Molly! She started riding the OTTB I had grown wary of and their relationship has been as easy as ours had been difficult. Mother and daughter have since become valued members of our little barn family. It’s amazing where a chance meeting a dose of humility can lead.

“Never give up” served me well for 25 years. It made me a better rider, a more patient partner, and the right person for a horse like Lola.

But at 70, I’ve learned a harder lesson: sometimes, “never give up” on a horse means giving up on yourself. The right horse isn’t a surrender. It’s a recognition. Of your limits. Of your joy. Of the simple fact that a safe, steady draft can be just as fulfilling as a downtrodden Thoroughbred you redeemed.

These days, I don’t cringe at that social media advice. I just wish I’d listened sooner.