A rant about taking care of your animals…

So, it’s still winter – FYI – and the snow and bitter cold has kept me out of the barn recently, and has kept our lab, Sadie, inside for the most part. Karl and I feel so badly for her when it’s bad out b/c there are less trips to the barn, less walks around the neighborhood, no playing ball (we’ve tried and lost two in the snow already!) and not as much time and space as she needs. But we try our hardest to give her lots of attention and playtime. And Sky is well taken care of , even when I’m not there, thanks to the magic world of boarding with someone I know takes good care of her (thanks Lisa).

See, I think it’s important to take care of your animals, should you choose to have them, just as it’s important to take care of your children, should you choose to have those… It’s been my experience that neither acquisition is a well thought out one by many people – it’s WANT first and SHOULD later…

When we were living at Fort Bliss, we’d see all kinds of dogs and cats strayed b/c people would get them and then move, or else not be able to take care of them… it was sad – I’ll never forget this beautiful English Sheepdog that lived a street over from us, always chained up outside in the hot sun, and not shaved of his big coat in the middle of summer. I always thought of the people who got him – they must have thought he was so cute as a puppy – then brought him home to their small military housing to realize that he was a boisterous dog who knocked things over and got in the way – so outside he went and in the two years we were there I never saw him walked or interacted with in any way… I could be wrong – maybe he was well taken care of, but it didn’t seem that way to me.

Sadie is a good dog – one that I cannot imagine living my life without. She was free and that was a gift worth millions. A couple that was leaving Fort Bliss gave her to us b/c where they were going they couldn’t have dogs. When we went to pick her up, she went straight to Karl and when he knelt down to greet her, she parked herself right between his legs and looked at me with an expression I’ll never forget that just said, “let’s go home”… She sailed into the backseat of the Alero and has been our dog ever since!

I sometimes question whether it’s fair to her to keep her in our 2 bedroom apartment. I’m sure it’s not – she should be able to go in and out all day and have much more room. We’re working on that angle, and I am faithful that before the snow is gone, we’ll be on our way to getting into a house of our own. There are lots of dogs at our apartments, and most of the people I’m sure are in the same boat as we are – I see lots of dogs being taken out and played with and running around the woods…

There is, however, a couple who live directly above us who have a dog that I don’t think they take care of very well. I think it’s an example of “oh, honey, let’s get a puppy!” and “sure we can have dogs here” without a thought to what kind of animal fit their lifestyle… These people are gone all the time – sometimes late at night and sometimes nearly all weekend. How do I know? Well, their adorable little puppy barks and whines and cries and throws himself against the door and floor the entire time these people are gone!!! It’s obnoxious! Karl and I feel so badly for him b/c it’s so obvious how upset this dog is when left alone – he has serious anxiety issues and cannot handle being alone… As much compassion as we have for the dog, I am quick to be annoyed by him, though… His constant struggles are an interruption to my quiet time – time I love. One of the reasons I like our apartment so much is the quiet – everyone is very subdued and it makes for a pleasant environment.

Now, I’ve talked to these people – a young girl and her boyfriend. She assured me she had NO IDEA that he barked while they were gone, and that they would do something about it… but two notes, complaining to the Super, and a call to the property managers later, nothing has changed. This weekend I realized by overhearing others in the hallway, that I’m not the only one bothered by this dog and I’m glad… I hope something will change soon.

Anyway, besides the noise, it’s borderline abusive to leave this dog alone and sad and stressed all day! There’s doggie day care – there are dog trainers – hell, there are little boys begging for a dog to play with right there in the building! The fact that these people think so little of their dog to leave him alone to cry and whine all day, knowing he is under stress, is sad. Sadie whimpers in her sleep and I rush to wake her from her bad puppy dream and comfort her! I cannot imagine knowing she was upset all day and taking immediate action… but not everyone is like me – some people don’t think about their animals… It upsets me.

C

Ok, so I am a bad blogger – bad, bad, bad.

I have my reasons. First is that it’s winter and although I love to look at the puffy blanket of white snow outside my window, I’m not much of a cold-weather girl. In fact, after Christmas I have absolutely no use for any day temping in at below fifty and I’m starting to consider Karl’s suggestion that we live somewhere warm for two months a year!

Anyway, my aversion to winter riding is well documented here, so I’ll move on. Christmas was… well, Christmas… I love the holiday season but it has seriously lost its luster for me in my adulthood – I tried to convince Karl that it will come back for us when there are children in our household. Who knows?

I spent New Year’s holed up at home with the dog (Karl had to work and I didn’t feel like facing parties full of couples alone… and that’s not as sad as it sounds). Being holed up has become a theme for me lately and I promise myself I will try to snap out of it. Since Christmas came and went, I’ve had a barrage of excuses to exclude myself from one activity or another – I haven’t even taken out my sewing machine since I put it away for Christmas company and I have limited my barn activities to getting on Sky for a total of 10 minutes about once every three weeks. I know, it’s sad, but honestly there aren’t many places to go considering the trails are iced over and the roads have limited visibility with all the snow banks (excuses)…

I did try to make a comeback use of my gym membership and it lasted about three weeks before I got bored (longer than usual do to my new ipod). Lisa wants to do a kickboxing class twice a week and I’m up for that.

I have an hour and a half for lunch now, with Jamie out for her maternity leave. I work until 530, which kind of stinks, but isn’t so bad.

Other than that there is precious little to report. Work is work and Karl is drudging through his night shifts in Bedford. We are hoping to be able to buy a house this year (part of the whole, “when we will have kids” conversation – its one step at a time). Cross your fingers for us – we’re meeting with a bank guy to see what we might be able to qualify for at the end of the month. I figure we’ll shop around with whatever pre-approval we can get and if we find something, great, and if not, then we’ll improve our credit etc. and try again later.

Of course I’m in love with a house – it’s in Concord and not enough space for Sky but it’s very close to my work and abuts a park. It’s an old house and is probably too far out of our price range, but something to stalk anyway!

Well, I am hoping to break out of my winter slump soon and am still wishing for an early Spring.

C

I said, "Brr.. It's cold in here!

Today was a day that could freeze your **** off! Christmas is soon (so soon!) and with the cold here, and the snow soon to come, riding is taking a backseat... just like last winter, I feel exceptionally guilty to not be riding very much... but I think this happens to me every year, followed by some serious sadness and then grumpiness until I'm in the saddle again... I know you hard-core horse people out there will tell me to ride in the snow and the cold, but I'm not that girl... I hate cold - part of me is ready to pack up Sky and spend the winter in El Paso with Bob!

Anyway, Christmas soon and that justifies the cold - after Christmas and New Year's are over we are left with nothing but the cold...

Sky is fine. She's haired up and hanging out with her horse friends and eating round bales and is cozy at night in her stall. I am making Christmas stockings and another baby quilt and preparing to someday do some Christmas shopping... I'm all for changes in season and changes in routine, but it's not even January yet and I'm longing for a warm spring day when you can smell the mud and feel the last of the snow melting and hear the sun come out behind the clouds... I am ready to spend hours shedding out. I am ready to be thinking about next year's shows. I am ready for camping and trail rides and hot days....

it's early to be longing for all of that... I know... but it's freezing out and all I have are thoughts of spring to get me through!

Merry Christmas.

C

Thanksgiving

Well, this week marks the start of the holiday season, and the traditional American holiday of Thanksgiving. I am a big fan of Thanksgiving and I'll tell you why - it is the ONLY holiday that there are no gifts! Now, don't get me wrong, I like Christmas and I am not one to turn down a gift, but as an adult, I have come to be jaded by obligational gift-giving... I suppose I don't understand the concept that we have fully celebrated a holiday if I buy you a gift card and you buy me a gift card - why didn't we each just keep our twenty bucks!?

Anyway, my aversion to over-commercialized Hallmark Holidays is a topic for another day... Thanksgiving is my favorite because it's a great excuse to get a family together, with nothing more than a simple meal and togetherness. I also love that there are no expectations. And the thanking - I am a big fan of the Thanking!

So, in honor of Thanksgiving, and in the true spirit of being thankful for all of the blessings in the past year, I have compiled a short list of things I am thankful for - Thanks for reading.

- Thanks for the great family I have. I might not see them as much as I should or always appreciate them, but at the heart of my existence are two parents who raised me right and have always supported me, and an extended family that is super strong and full of love.
- Thanks to my husband, who is the only person who can drive me to the brink of insanity and still be the only person I want to be around! Thanks to him for being strong, putting up with my crazy schemes, and for always being calm when I am not.
- Thanks to Lisa, who has welcomed Sky and I into her barn and her life, being a good friend and letting me tag along with her to every show I could muster this year. Thanks to her for not thinking less of me when I was scared to get Sky off the trailer in the middle of a rainstorm, for instantly offering to let me live with her and Josh upon learning Karl was to go to Iraq, and for always being a phone call/text/email/ away.
- Thanks to John, who spent the majority of this year giving me free advice rather than lessons, which I couldn't always afford. John has been the Yoda of Sky and I this year - without him our progression certainly wouldn't have been so smooth.
- Thanks for Sadie, who although she is just a dog, is the most loyal person I know. Thanks for all the kisses, Sadie, and all the cuddling in a chair that shouldn't fit two of us, and for sleeping with me when Karl is gone, and for the wags... I so love the wags.
- Thanks, to SHA - Sanborn, Head & Associates gave me a job when I was not sure what was going to happen next, and now that I've been there almost ten months, thanks for being there to anchor me down when not much else was making sense. It's not always the most fun place to be, but it's constent and that's good sometimes.
- Thanks for Sky - I have said a lot on this blog about how important Sky is to me, and I could go on and on again but I'll just say this... she makes a great Kleenex when I need to cry - all things about her presense make me feel better by the time I leave her stall.
- Thanks for the roof over my head, and the food in my lunchbox, and the shower I took yesterday. Thanks for the second car (finally!) and for gas being under two dollars, thanks for things that I take for granted everyday.
- Thanks to Christina, who is my kindred spirit and my margarita buddy.
- Thanks for Beth (and Marcia) and for another great year at East Corinth... Thanks for another great year of trails.
- Thanks for Betsy, and Harvey, for leading us out on such great rides this year - and for allowing us a spot in the trailer!
- Thanks for everywhere I have been and everywhere I am going... thanks for the bad days that led to better ones and thanks for the messes that led to successes... I am so thankful that I have so much - but most of all I am thankful for the opportunity that lays ahead of me. I have the power in my life to make tomorrow better than today - there is SO MUCH ahead in life for me and that is what I am most thankful for.

Happy Thanksgiving to all - I hope you take time to remember what you are thankful for - don't give gifts, don't send cards, don't make Thanksgiving something it's not - eat Turkey, laugh with your family, and be thankful... that's all Thanksgiving wants.

:)

Oh, the Equine Affaire… a glorious excuse for horse people all over New England to take time off of work, spend too much money, and sneer at other horse people who certainly cannot be nearly as knowledgeable/talented/dedicated as you.

This year was a little different for me b/c I went with Lisa, instead of hooking up with Beth and the Keene gang. Despite the rain we had a good time, although the mystique of the event is wearing off for me. I know too much what to expect, I suppose. There’s the buildings full of vendors selling everything there is horse – from the latest vitamin supplement sure to cure all your equine’s ailments to manure forks guaranteed to cut your barn chore time in half. There are the clinics – trainers from all over who all think they have the magic answer. And then there’s my personal favorite, a parade of horse trailers (as I told Lisa, this section is my “crack”) that are all too expensive and out of reach but yet I always wander through, smelling the “new trailer smell” and visioning me and Sky camping and showing and going to clinics in.

There was one trailer (see the photos) that I loved. Lisa and I thought it was great, but of course my husband was unimpressed considering he doesn’t understand that the only other one-horse alternatives are flimsy European jobs… I love this trailer – it’s SO CUTE. I loved that it had a dressing room and was so slim and cute…. I could totally see Sky self-loading on it and me setting up my bed in the back on camping trips (don’t laugh, it can be done!). My only beef about it is that it’s $8500!! Now, here’s my philosophy on this. If the four-horse is twice as much as the two-horse, then why isn’t the one-horse half the price of the two-horse! I think it’s only logical, don’t you?

Lisa was more interested in shopping than the clinics, which was fine with me considering there wasn’t anything I was dying to see that day. I bought Sky a winter blanket and myself a new vest. I got a Paint decal for the Explorer, which I am waiting to see how long it takes until Karl notices its presence (he won’t be happy about it).

We bumped into a lot of people we knew - Beth and her daughter, John and Lisa Toli, Marty from East Corinth – and of course lots of people Lisa knew and I think I may have met before. There seems to be a lot of drama surrounding the upcoming election for NHQHA which I’m a little glad I’m not involved in (sorry to those of you who are).

It wasn’t as crowded as I remember it being, which is good b/c after an hour or two pushing and shoving in a crowd of people, I am not as pleasant as I am normally. Lisa got tired pretty quickly, which I can understand, so we cut out around three.

Seasons change

Well, now that it’s officially fall and officially cold and officially dark at 5:00, I am not doing much riding. I didn’t ride for two weeks and then Sunday Betsy and I headed out to the last Blackwater Trail Rider ride of the year, at Marsh-Billings Rockefeller National Park in Woodstock. I think neither one of us really wanted to drive the hour away but did really want to see the park.

We met up with about six or seven women, some from our group and some from a northern NH group, I think from Canaan. It was a beautiful town and the rumors that there is a lot of money there are not false, according to the stately buildings and cute shops. We parked in a great little lot and after crossing someone’s backyard, headed into the park. The trails were lovely – mostly gravel packed roads, big enough to ride two-by-two on. It was easy to see that the trails were made carefully… all the drainage went off the trails and they followed loops around the woods so would be difficult to get lost.

We headed up a gradual slope to a great lookout. On the way we passed through a couple of gorgeous fields and someone’s horse decided to roll in the yellowing grass! (see photo!) The lookout was beautiful and there were even hitching posts there! The ride just made me want to bring Beth and Marcia, who I know would appreciate the trails… some of the ladies said this place was better than Arcadia, and that made me think an overnight trip might be in order! I think it would be a cool place to go for a weekend!

Anyway, we rode for about two hours and my favorite part was the pond which we circled. We met a young family there and when the kids asked to pet a horse, I was surprised no one said anything… so I offered Sky for them to meet and they were really grateful. I think it’s important to share horses with kids… especially nowadays when kids don’t seem to care about anything that isn’t a video game!

I thought it was a long trip for such a short ride, but it was fun. Sky did great, although she was a little excited to be near Harvey. I can’t blame her. Overall she behaved really well. I need to ride more but it is dark by the time I get out of work, which is just leaving the weekend.

Other than that, I am doing well. I started going to the chiropractor, which is interesting. Karl is working a few jobs and is doing well. Thanksgiving is coming and we’re having a passel of people at our house! The Equine Affaire is Friday and I’m taking a day off… it’s fall… I’m already counting down to Spring!
C

Sky’s Grand Adventure

When one gets a phone call on a Saturday morning from a friend who is not the friend who keeps one’s horse saying that said horse is in this friend’s yard, one tends to panic.

Betsy called me and left a message on Saturday morning. I was in the middle of frantically finishing a baby quilt for a friend’s shower the next day, so I did not hear the phone ring. Immediately I thought that Betsy wanted to ride and as I checked the message, I felt badly b/c again there aren’t enough hours in the day to get everything done. However, upon listening to this message I realized it was a whole other story.

Betsy said something to the effect that “a horse that looked likes Sky and a Chestnut that she didn’t know” were in her yard and that she was going to call Lisa and then try to catch them… I immediately call Lisa who had no idea what I was talking about and ran outside to count horses…. Here I am on the phone and she’s calmly going... “One, two, three… Scarlet, Onyx, Willow…” It was pretty funny.

So, we agree that she’s going to call Betsy and call me back and when she does I find out that Sky is caught over there and in their paddock but the other horse, who we determine to have been Gypsy, found her way back on her own.

Without much drama, Lisa takes a halter over to Betsy’s and walks Sky home. Other than Harvey being upset that his houseguest was leaving, there was no harm done. After laughing about how silly Sky is to have gotten out and found her way to Betsy’s house, where’s she’s been on more than one occasion, I realize I am lucky. If she had gone up the power lines instead of down the trail to Betsy’s she could have been really lost – she could have gotten out to the highway. It made me think of all those people whose horses get lost in forests, never to be seen again.

My panic didn’t last b/c my horse was back in her pasture eating a new round bale before I knew it. Lisa felt pretty badly about the whole thing, which she didn’t need to – stuff happens. I am just glad my horse is smart enough to go visiting through the woods, and not down the road!
I will hopefully get to ride tonight – it gets dark out so fast!

C