The Soul of a Horse (13 page)

As frustrating as that seemed to me at the time, I suppose the good news was that it was a
boat.
An inanimate piece of fiberglass and machinery. And if the owner wanted to pour his money into that…well, it’s his money.

But a horse is not a boat.

A horse lives and breathes, and has feelings, and worries, and a genetic system that has evolved over millions and millions of years. A boat doesn’t pace and stress when it’s tied in a slip. It doesn’t have a herd that it should be with. It doesn’t worry about being attacked by everything that blinks. A boat doesn’t need to be out where it can move around all day and night. A boat doesn’t feel happy or unhappy, or healthy or unhealthy because it is or isn’t being ignored by its owner.

A horse does.

Mariah did, once upon a time.

But she doesn’t feel that way anymore.

Ask her and she’ll tell you which way is better.

19

Feelings

T
he stallion stood in the flat, searching the rise around the big rock. His friend had not shown up and it was now the day of the third snow. Winter was on its way and he sensed that it was going to be severe. Never had the snow come so early, nor the second and third snow so quickly. The matriarch was restless, wanting to move their charges south before the weather made it impossible.

The stallion left the herd and trotted up the rise for a closer look, searching the trees along the ridge and scanning every inch of ground down the rise. His friend had never missed the first snow. He had no way of knowing that the Powhatan warrior had been badly wounded in a battle between his adopted tribe and the neighboring Blackfeet. He had fought valiantly to help the Shoshone protect their hunting rights so they could feed their families.

The snow was coming harder now, blanketing the rise in white silence. The huge golden horse looked to his herd and back up the hill. He paced nervously, and the snow fell faster. He was just retreating to the herd when a movement caught his eye, high up the rise. A flutter, a shadow in the snow. He strained to see through the filter of white. But it was gone. Then back. Another movement. He was sure of it. He trotted up the hill, gaining speed as he recognized the shape on the ground as human, his human. He slid to a stop and looked down on his friend, crumpled in the snow, a trail of red stretching out behind him. The Powhatan was trying to pull himself toward the rock, the meeting place, but his strength was gone and he was shivering uncontrollably. He saw the great stallion’s feet and strained to look upward. The sight of his friend vanquished his pain. A smile spread across his face and a tear slipped down his cheek.

The great horse dropped to his knees and stretched out on the ground next to him, trying to warm him. His friend wrapped his arms around the big stallion’s neck, clinging to him as if he were life itself.

And then he was gone.

The stallion’s scream shattered the surrounding silence, again and again. But he didn’t move. The matriarch appeared, and others from the herd, but they stood quietly and watched the falling snow cover this human warrior who meant so much to their protector. Finally, the stallion climbed to his feet and gazed down at the man, the human, with whom he had come so far. He reached to the ground and nuzzled away the mound of snow hiding the man’s cheek. The warm nostrils of this elegant stallion breathed in one last remembrance, then he lifted his head to the trees and bellowed as if his heart were being ripped apart. Then he turned and raced down the rise toward the south, flying like the wind. For hours he ran, until he could run no more, and he lay down and went to sleep.

When he awoke, he was surrounded by his herd, who had followed him south and almost kept up with him. The stallion would never again see the valley of his friend. The grasslands would turn into hard earth and rock, and then prairie, but his herd was fit and their feet were like rocks themselves, and the journey would be made without incident or injury. When they reached a fine valley with good grasses, they stopped, and there the stallion’s progeny would live for ten generations.

It would be more than a hundred years before any of them would ever meet another human. But, somehow, the memory of how much humans can mean to the horse would not be lost or forgotten.

20

Sonny Boy and Painto

W
e know it’s there. That relationship between horse and human. All horses. Any horse. If you know his language, understand what makes him tick, what makes him feel safe, that horse will allow you into that special place called relationship. Some feel the connection can be spiritual, even mystical. Those who believe the horse is inherently mean and must be dominated have sadly missed a very important fork in life’s road. An editorial in the
New York Times
following the euthanasia of Barbaro put it this way: “You would have to look a long, long time to find a dishonest or cruel horse. And the odds are that if you did find one, it was made cruel or dishonest by the company it kept with humans. It is no exaggeration to say that nearly every horse is pure of heart.”

In all his years, I believe Monty Roberts has only encountered one horse with whom he wasn’t ultimately able to establish a relationship.

“Are you saying you should try to establish a relationship with every horse you encounter?” I was asked not too long ago.

“If you intend to spend any time with him, yes,” I answered.

“Even borrowed horses, or rental horses?”

“If you care about the horse as another living being, yes.”

“Is it really worth it? Does it make a difference?”

“To you, or the horse?” I asked.

He shrugged, not sure how to answer.

“Either, I guess,” he said. “Both?”

I told him this story.

Kathleen and I were headed for a three-day trail ride west of Albany, Texas, riding borrowed horses because it was too far away to bring ours from home. This would be the first time since our nosedive into the horse world that either of us would be on horses other than our own. Horses we did not know. Horses we had not schooled. Horses with whom we had no relationship, who had never heard of Join-Up. And there was no facility to accommodate such a silly notion.

“I’m told these are good horses,” I said to Kathleen. “Well trained. Calm. Let’s just go and have a good time. Put the whole relationship thing aside for three days.”

“I can do that,” she responded, “but I doubt that you can. It’s your scorpion.”

There’s an old story about a scorpion begging a frog to swim him across the river. The frog calls the scorpion nuts.
We’ll get in the middle of the river and you’ll sting me!

Why would I do that?
the scorpion replies.
I’d drown with you.

That made sense to the frog so he agreed to swim the scorpion across, and sure enough, right in the middle of the river, the scorpion stings the frog.

Now we’re both going to die!
screamed the frog.

I know,
said the scorpion.
I just couldn’t help myself.

“I can help myself,” I promised Kathleen. “I can do it.”

One of the reasons I really wanted to go on this trail ride is that we had been wrapped up in the world of horses for more than a year and Kathleen still harbored a bit of fear, rising on occasion, just under the surface. Especially when riding faster than a walk. Her prior experience with horses, before we owned our own, was, in her own words, “from the ground looking up.” Four trail rides as a teenager on a horse named Jack. She was dumped all four times. Unbeknownst to her at the time, Jack had also dumped a jet-fighter pilot. Those were her last times on a horse until she gave me the trail ride for my birthday. I was convinced that mileage was all she needed. Three days of riding, all day, every day, would take her light-years down the road toward confidence. I was certain of it.

She was now much more experienced, but she was also putting up a good front. Every time she climbed into a saddle, her insides were churning, betrayed by the number of times she quoted clinician Linda Parelli saying, “Whenever you feel the least bit uncomfortable, just get off. Right then. Immediately.”

Some say stay on a bit longer. I discovered years ago that you cannot rid yourself of any fear if you don’t push through it. If you don’t stretch yourself. The trick, then, is how to do that while staying out of harm’s way. Keeping yourself safe. Only then will you be calm and focused enough to actually learn and become confident in your skills.

But how do you do that if you have a crazy, high-spirited horse?

The simple answer is: Don’t have a crazy, high-spirited horse if you’re a beginner.

I’ve watched dozens of clinician DVDs and a few live clinics, and I’m continually amazed at the horses many of these scared-out-of-their-minds beginners (and not-so-beginners) show up with. You only lose your fear through mileage—time and experience—and you’re not going to get much mileage if you’re afraid your horse is going to kill you. Making matters worse, when you’re afraid, your adrenaline is up and your horse can read that, and his adrenaline will rise as well. Monty Roberts says, “Adrenaline up, learning down. Adrenaline down, learning up.”

Pat Parelli tells about one of his clinics in Australia where he asked everyone to demonstrate their horses so he could get some sense of what he would be dealing with. After seeing each student ride, he told the group that he wouldn’t think of riding
any
of the horses he had just seen.

Pat would school them first. Create relationships and safety. And even for a beginner, that can mean progress. But some horses, even with relationship, are too much for some beginners to cope with. Too spirited. Too excitable. It depends so much on the horse, and the human, and the human’s fear threshold. Pat Parelli has decades of experience reading horses and communicating with them. For the beginner or early intermediate, there’s a much simpler answer to pushing through fears and gaining confidence. Don’t let your eye get caught by that young, feisty, wild and crazy horse just because he looks so cool.

It’s true.

Kathleen is proof.

She learned nothing when she was garbled with fear about falling off. She learned very quickly after finding Skeeter.

“But I can only afford one horse,” comes the usual response.

“Perfect,” I say. “Get a Skeeter.”

“No. I want a horse that will be good for me when I become an expert.”

“If you start with that horse, you might never become an expert. And if you do, it’ll surely take much, much longer.”

Everybody, of course, doesn’t need a Skeeter. People are different, and have different thresholds. And horses are different. The point is to find the right relationship for what you’re doing at the time. My fear threshold was higher than Kathleen’s. It only kicked in when it came time for me to canter, to go fast. I put off doing that forever. Cash loves to go fast. I didn’t, in the beginning. My adrenaline would soar at the very thought of it. Then, of course, so would Cash’s.

So finally what I did was drop down to Mariah.

Literally.

Sweet, tiny, sensitive—did I say small?—
obedient
Mariah. If I was to fall off, the ground was only half the distance of a launch from Cash, or so it seemed. Her speed was much more manageable than Cash’s. And because her legs were shorter, her gait was shorter. Never mind that none of that should matter; it did. Emotionally. Pushing through my fear would be a lot safer on Mariah.

Perception.

When it comes to fear, perception is the key ingredient. Just ask a horse.

I knew that the only way I could ever effectively work on Cash’s speed was to be able to focus on the speed, not my fears. Develop confidence in the saddle at a canter. “Get my seat,” as the clinicians say. My balance point.

Lose the fear.

And lo and behold, when I went back to Cash and asked for that first canter, because my adrenaline wasn’t up, neither was his, and he loped away at a very calm, leisurely pace, thank you very much, and stopped when I asked him to. It continues to amaze me how that works.

If you can only have one horse, then make it one horse
at a time.
The
right
horse for
each
time. Then you can push right through your fears and concentrate on learning, and teaching, and becoming confident. Both you and your horse. You can actually build a relationship, instead of just going through the motions out of fear.

Don’t fall into that instant gratification bucket.
Here, Mr. Trainer, make Flicka the perfect horse that will love and respect me and do everything I say. Immediately.

Pat Parelli says that’s like sending your spouse to a trainer.

Kathleen jokes that we have six horses: mine, and the five she went through trying to dispel her fears. For various reasons, each horse came up too much for her, or so she thought. Until Skeeter. He had pretty much seen it all in his eighteen years; a seasoned veteran who had been around the block, not much bothered him. His roping career had taken him all over the place, in and out of trailers, arenas, and stalls, all furnished with noise, strange goings-on, and raised adrenalines. He was a good home for Kathleen and, after Join-Up, gave her plenty of calm and quiet to practice her training and riding skills. To build her confidence. He taught her well, and now she rides and works with everyone in our herd, except Cash. And I don’t think she’s far from taking a turn with him.

If she had continued to work with a young, feisty, easily excitable horse—even with Join-Up and extensive work on the ground building relationship, leadership, and control—I don’t believe she would’ve ever effectively been that horse’s leader, be what he needed to respect her. There was too much fear and worry blocking her concentration. It was the wrong horse for her to be riding at that stage of her development.

But with Skeeter, she was able to focus, and teach, and learn. And her fears were all but vanquished when we headed off to Texas for the three-day trail ride.

The ride would put us in the saddle for six to seven hours a day for three days, maybe as many as twenty hours, which probably equaled the total number of hours Kathleen had spent in the saddle during the entire past year. Her rides at home usually averaged fifteen to twenty minutes each.

She needed mileage.

The ride was a benefit to restore Fort Griffin, a Civil War village and compound, put on by our dear friend country-western singer-songwriter Red Steagall. I had dreamed of nights around the campfire listening to Red sing and recite cowboy poetry. My Boot Barn boots were now well broken in and ready for the real thing.

We flew into Dallas–Fort Worth then drove out to the campsite with Red and his wife. The horse I would ride, Sonny Boy, was in the trailer, but Painto, Kathleen’s mount, was coming with another rider and would be staying at a different, remote campsite. This was a shame. But, as it turned out, it provided a fascinating study.

Red and I put up the temporary corral, and as we walked the horses down to the watering bucket, Sonny Boy and I stopped, backed up, went forward again, and made several U-turns. I asked him to move his hindquarters, and he swung them left and right, catching on to my cues quickly. He seemed to think it was a game, and enjoyed getting a rub for a job well done. I backed him away with the lead line, rubbed him again, and otherwise began to pry myself into the thinking side of Sonny Boy’s gray matter.

“Scor…pi…on,” Kathleen chortled, walking along beside me.

I didn’t even attempt an excuse. She was right. She knew it, and I knew it. I had to connect, or at least try.

I had Sonny Boy trot circles on the lead line, and change direction, and I ultimately stopped and turned away to see if he would walk up to me. A poor boy’s Join-Up. He did. I spent some time just hanging out with him, with no agenda. Just being there. After a bit, he was following me around the pen.

And Kathleen had yet to even meet Painto.

Had Sonny Boy and I actually joined up? Probably not. He had been on a line, not free to roam. Was it better than just walking up and climbing on? Absolutely. We were getting to know each other, and he was learning that I was an interesting, reasonably capable human, not just someone who crawled on for a ride. He was learning that I would give him choices, and could engage his brain, and cause him to move. In short, I was establishing myself in the role of a benevolent leader. Someone Sonny Boy would listen to. Someone he could trust. And someone he would not fear.

We had never met. Didn’t know each other. But we both knew that one of the criteria of leadership is determined by who moves who around. Who can walk up with a simple pinning of the ears and move the other horse away from a pile of hay or a watering hole. Sometimes it might require a nip on the butt, or just the threat of a nip. The criterion is the same with the human-horse relationship. I’ve never bitten a horse on the butt, but when I can—with a mere shake of the lead line, a pointing of a finger, or a touch to the hindquarters—move the horse from here to there, and control his various body parts, it generates respect that translates into trust. I become the leader. This is one of those equine concepts that is difficult for humans to grasp because we attach emotion to the action, when, to the horse, there is none. It’s just the way they are, and is as much a part of their nature as eating.