This photo was taken at Toler's first show. ( Fall of '03? I can't quite remember.) It was a dressage show, and we won High Point for our division (earning a big neck ribbon that only just barely fit around Toler's neck). Somewhere we have a video of his first test--though I can't bear to watch myself ride. It was a pretty perfect day. We don't have many photos of it, sadly, and the photo CD we ordered from the roll of film seems to have started to (horribly) degrade, as all the images have huge amounts of noise and speckles on them. So, I did some PS doctoring on this shot to make it at least presentable for my Awesome Photoblog. (=But this post isn't really going to be about that photo, or even that first show, really. See, ever since that first show season we've done nothing but recover and return to the basics. Injury, retraining, injury, retraining. It feels like a never-ending cycle, which my being away for college didn't help.
Most of the time I wonder where we would be if none of those setbacks had happened. If I had gone to college here, in town. I'm not really sure. Maybe we'd be jumping 3'6" without a fault. Maybe we'd be finessing tempi changes, the passage, reworking canter pirouettes. Maybe we'd be old pros at the training-level three-day events, which, honestly, had always been my riding goal. Cross country over big, wide, solid fences. Over drops and water jumps. The sport of trust, endurance, athleticism, and a dollop of insanity.
After our latest setback--our jumping accident two summers ago--I'm not really even sure I will ever complete a cross-country course. I typically feel fine about the prospect of being an eventer. Enthusiastic, even. But then, in the saddle, counting strides to the base of a simple 2'3" oxer, I get caught by nerves and doubt, a tiny corner of my head pondering the worst. I find, after over ten years of riding, that suddenly *I'm* the one needing a boost of confidence, the one feeling wobbly and insecure. Like the roles have changed overnight. Somehow I've become the cautious rider. No longer the ambitious "crazy" of the barn, the one nicknamed (until I got Toler, at least,) "Velcro-Butt." I tell myself we're healing.
Toler does his best these days to instill my confidence in him. And, really, he has matured so much in the past few years. So much, in fact, that my mother can ride him quite comfortably. He has to hold his own jumping, now, no longer relying on me to hold him over every fence or correct his striding and balance. Not when I'm focusing so much on confidence. Sometimes I think he has decided that he let me down that summer. I hold his nose close to my body, kiss the soft hair between his ear and forelock.
I think the worst part of retraining isn't the repetition, the boredom of the old and already-(once)-conquered. The worst part is learning, again, to trust. Completely. Without question.
Trust.
