Leap day

I’m sure bloggers all over the WordPress Nation are clicking away about Leap Day and the six million ways to “carpe diem” and so forth…but really, the idea of a “free day” is pretty tempting.

Today I did not hoof around the barn or teach or ride or do what I do on a “normal” day; typically I teach two classes as well as practices two or three days a week, get some horses ridden, chase horses in the indoor, play with my tack rooms, fold a ton of blankets, turn out Tres and get tossed around by Josey, etc. etc. etc. But today was the start of written midterms, as well as the Wednesday of a horse show week. Instead, I spent most of the day in my office, on the computer, typing and formatting and listening to Pandora. (I wonder sometimes if this is what my life would be like if I did not like horses. How depressing. But a treat every now and then.) I did not ride a horse. I did not further Playgirl’s education, I did not teach a student something new, I did not help a single soul to do anything differently on horseback. I sat on my butt in a heated office and ate a granola bar.

Is this any way to treat a “free” day? Whether or not you’re religious, it’s hard to argue that every day really is a gift, do with it what you will. Clicking things on a computer screen seems like a sad way to spend a bonus day. If given the choice of a free day, I would probably spend it riding.

What will I be doing this evening? I’m looking forward to sitting on the couch eating ice cream and watching TV shows on Netflix. Maybe I’ll do a little knitting. I might go to bed early. I did not seize this day.

But you know what? I had a great day. I’m continuing to have a great evening. I laughed a lot today, especially when we decided to take a field trip to Tractor Supply two towns over because Rebecca decided she wanted to snuggle a duck (incidentally, Tractor Supply does not allow you to do so.) So leap day, here’s to you. I carped this diem by doing something I never really have time to do–sit on my butt and take it easy.

Homecoming

If you don’t already read Horse Nation, you should definitely check it out, especially on Tuesdays, as I now write a weekly western column called “In My Boots.” Essentially, I am the first western columnist for the website so I can write about almost anything under the western umbrella as long as it’s relatively educational and relatively funny. My first post today got 360 views as of right now! Thanks, readers!

In other news, Peppy is back at Alfred, meaning that all three of my horses finally reside at the same place for a brief time. Fortunately Peppy is technically sold but cannot go to her new home until the semester’s end, when her student leaves school for the summer. So for now, she gets to kick around the Alfred barn; luckily for everyone, myself and Peppy included, Western IV will be starting to work on roping, games and cowhorse–all things Peppy is good at. Therefore she can earn her keep for the next three months while we wait for it to become May.

Previously, I had leased Peppy out to another barn in the area to use in its lesson program for the state college across the street in Alfred. That barn needed to clear out stalls for spring clients, so back she came–yesterday. I drove to the next village over, down a winding country road and pulled up at the little farm which used to belong to Harry a few years ago. There she was, the same old Pep, standing in the arena, a little fuzzier than normal but otherwise exactly as she was, her too-big ears pricked in my direction.

On the trip back to the barn, I couldn’t help but feel a warm sense of familiarity; I was driving my own horse back home again. When I had settled her into her stall in the hay barn, I hung out for a few minutes to chat with Kait, and at every glance towards her remarkably-mule-like silhouette in the stall, was reminded again that my horse was back.

Except that she isn’t, really, not any more. Nor, truthfully, do I really need her or want her to be. We had our time, but that time is passed now. She’s back, but not to stay–just to visit for awhile. And then she’ll move on and be someone else’s everything, that special horse, that partner, that friend. That’s Peppy’s job, and she does it well.

February in New York

As everyone all over the country is commenting, this has not been a typical winter–so I will skip the exclamations of “gee golly, we haven’t got much snow this year!” etc. I never remember the exact weather from year to year but I will say I’m fairly certain that last February we had a lot more snow on the ground.

Thanks to the warm weather, I spent my Sunday on Justin’s land (our facility manager and Becca’s landlord) hiking with Becca and the dogs. We followed an ice-crusted path up the big hill, holding apart strands of barbed wire for each other as the dogs dodged underneath, then trudged across a number of fields until we were at the top, following a two-track along the ridge from field to woodlot to field again. At one point we paused to look over the valleys on either side of us, quiet for once, snow visible through the skeletal trees waiting for true spring.

Later that afternoon we took the dogs out again and headed to Justin’s house where he was planning to boil some sap. First, though, he explained to us as he stacked wood in his garage, we had to go set up one more line up in the woods and a few other sundry chores. Becca and Sage and I sat in the back of the pickup to accompany Justin up to the woodlot for one more load. Justin “opened up” the truck across the field to watch Becca’s dog Mona run–she kept up at around 35 mph.

We loaded another truck bed of wood and then bounced back across the field, switched trucks, collected a bunch of tapping materials–various lengths of tubing, plastic T links and “spiles”–the part of the operation that actually taps into the tree–and roared back off into the trees again, dogs rollicking in the wake of the truck as Becca and I bounced around in the bed and shrieked with laughter, Mona roaring along flat-out next to us like a canine cheetah. For a moment it was like being back out on the ranch again.

Justin has what looks like miles of tap line stretched from tree to tree. We crunched our way over the ice through the trees, the blue lines running roughly downhill jumping from maple to maple. Some of the more modern maple “farms” or syrup producers use vacuum lines to literally suck sap from the trees; the practice is controversial because some traditional producers believe that the vacuum lines remove too much sap and don’t leave enough for the tree to live on from year to year. Justin follows more of the traditional system–he only started using tap lines this year; he used to use individual buckets on each tree. He still plans to tap this way in addition to the lines, mostly for aesthetics.

First we anchored the line to a likely-looking tree slightly uphill from the main line, and then stretched it taut, angling downhill to a number of other maples. Justin then proceeded to drill a shallow hole into each tree and inserted a spile, using a nifty line-cutting tool to keep the tension and strong connection. As the sun was sinking over the hills to the west, we continued to work our way down the hill, Justin’s wife and toddler son joining us on a four-wheeler.

The light soon faded from the grove and the dogs slowed their incessant running. We finished the tapping and piled back into the bed of the truck with the puppy, letting the dogs take one last run back down the hill as the last bits of sun vanished. We were chilled to the bone but happy. Maybe next time we’d be able to help boil and make some syrup. We live in New York, after all. Making maple syrup is part of this history.

The Versatile Blogger Award

Thanks to just another day out west for nominating The Western Life for this award: I’m not completely certain if it’s entirely just an award or also partially a game, but regardless I’m happy to receive it.

If you don’t read just another day out west, check it out: I’m not totally certain where in the west the writer lives, but she (I assume she, but in blog-land, who knows for sure?) keeps horses, does equine bodywork and is a reined cowhorse enthusiast–all brilliant recommendations.

As per the rules of the Versatile Blogger Award: seven random facts about me.

1. Even though I work in a barn six days a week, I love to paint my nails.
2. I love to knit, weave, spin and work with fibers. (I’m going to be such an old lady.)
3. I briefly considered picking up a second college degree in organic dairy farming (at the conveniently-located state college across the street.)
4. I used to be dreadfully shy. HA.
5. I love burning candles, having campfires, and woodburning stoves.
6. I no longer have a favorite color–I enjoy all colors equally.
7. I own three Quarter horses but do not own a single saddle.

I pass on the Versatile Blogger Award to the following blogs (some of which may already be nominated) Being fairly new on WordPress I don’t subscribe to many, so I have instead awarded five rather than seven:

Rein and Thunder: A fellow Western New Yorker with a horse–what’s not to love?
Cowgirl Up!: An avid adult equestrian riding from home–chronicles her horsey adventures on the trail.
stoneflowerpottery: My friend Elaine’s blog about her ceramic and tin art, as well as other various Western New York tales
The Thoroughbred Chronicles: Two of my students’ blog about their OTTB project. Always interesting to read!
Bitterroot Ranch Blog: My former summer employment, but blogging year-round. Another view of life on the ranch.

Rules for the award:

1. In a post on your blog, nominate 7 fellow bloggers for The Versatile Blogger Award.
2. In the same post, add the Versatile Blogger Award.
3. In the same post, thank the blogger who nominated you in a post with a link back to their blog.
4. In the same post, share 7 completely random pieces of information about yourself.
5. In the same post, include this set of rules.
6. Inform each nominated blogger of their nomination by posting a comment on each of their blogs.

Music

Now that Harry’s back north and covering most of the early morning practices, I drive to work in the daylight. Two nights of this past week, I’ve even driven home in the daylight. It’s a small thing, but having that sun just a little bit longer each day already makes it feel as though spring is on its way. Normally I am not one to anticipate the change of the seasons: I love each season equally. I love the crispness in the air and the colors of the hillsides in the autumn, the tang of woodsmoke in the air as snowflakes dance on a light breeze through the pines in winter, the green haze that takes the valley and creeps slowly up the hill to the barn in the spring. And the summer? Well, it’s been a five years since I’ve experienced an East Coast summer. I’m looking forward to this one (though I will miss the cold nights and hot days, the scent of sagebrush, the wild thunderstorms, the short and intense summers of Wyoming.)

But just enough of these daylit drives home awaken in me a desire for warmer days, longer days, days a little freer of responsibility. I am looking forward to sitting in the our tiny backyard around our fire pit (which we do intend to turn into a completely legal “outdoor grill” with the addition of a few bricks) listening to our little branch of the Kanakadea muttering to itself, maybe adding a little rock waterfall of our own, a few friends over to enjoy the falling evening, something cooking in the Dutch oven in the fire, the knowledge that there are no classes to teach, no horse shows to put on but the ones we wish to attend…

I am being idealistic, I realize. I’m sure not every night will be this perfect. In my memory, every night on the ranch was like that: I sat on the stoop of the Man Hut with my friends gathered all around me, the constant roar of the whitewater river in the background, watching the nighthawks slicing through the purple evening and the snow on the very tops of the Absarokas turning colors as the sun vanished over the western horizon. In reality, we spent a lot of nights on the internet inside–but let me live with my memories. They’ll make excellent stories someday.

I do hope, however, that with these summer nights I will have time again to play. I have been sadly neglectful of my mandolin–a beautiful instrument, all stained wood with its elegant scroll and mother-of-pearl flower vine blooming its way down the finger board. My first instrument was the violin, and after twelve years of strumming the violin during orchestra rehearsals and getting the stink eye from various directors, I realized perhaps I was meant to be playing the violin’s bluegrass cousin. An underappreciated instrument that I do not even come close to doing justice, the mandolin is just plain fun.

I play mine like a ukelele or baby guitar, strumming chords and singing along when alone, or when properly encouraged (a glass of wine and a large crowd of people talking amongst themselves usually does the trick.) I am not a talented singer, but I have a good time. I play things like Taylor Swift (so formulaic and easy! Major one, major five, minor three, major four…only her recent stuff is getting a little more musically interesting and therefore harder to guess) and simple pop tunes. Epic flatpicking from bluegrass stars? Not here. Terrible country covers? Count me in.

This will be the summer of the mandolin. I promise you, little weird unloved instrument gathering dust under my bed. If I am persistent enough, Peter might back me up with his guitar. If we’re tipsy enough, maybe Rebecca will join me on the native flute, a gift from the amazing Martha Hochman–may the flute play long in your memory.

I miss having music in my life. I think it’s time to start bringing it back. Even if no one hears us but the pines up the hill and the Kanakadea.

Teaching

As I’ve discussed with my dear friend Natalie, an art teacher in Watertown, New York, no one ever teaches teachers how to teach.

We learn what to teach, of course, and I’m sure education majors currently coming up through the ranks are being taught how to teach to standardized testing (thanks a lot, No Child Left Behind) but very few of us are ever told how to deal with certain situations, how to be engaging, how to handle problem students, how to get your students to respect you, how to get your students to actually learn something. For actual classroom teachers, they are supposed to learn as much as they can about this sort of thing when they are student teaching, then find a job in the school system and go from there. For riding instructors, they advertise, find students, wait for people to come to them, acquire horses, slowly build a business from the ground up and hope for the best.

I was very lucky: by being hired at a university, all of the basics that would take me years to acquire–facility, horses, students, and that illusive one, a million dollar insurance policy–were already provided for me. All I did was step into the job…and that was all I got. I had a skeleton curriculum left to me from the previous instructor and a list of names. The rest, I made up as I went along, borrowing from lessons I had had in the past but also guided a lot by the things I wished I had had the opportunity to learn. My supervisor asked Becca and me (Becca being in the exact same situation as me only teaching English) to audit the Methods of Teaching class offered last spring, and I’m personally quite glad she did. I learned so much in that semester from Leigh of High Time Stables–I had never had her as a teacher or coach before, so in this odd blend of classroom and arena I was pleased to get the time to work with her and years of experience building her own business. We were very lucky to get the opportunity to work on things like dealing with problem students (Becca and I gladly filling the roles of problem students for the kids taking the class) and even the basics on the business end of things.

I now feel fairly well-equipped as a teacher to continue my program, modify it as I see fit, work with the horses I have and deal with the students and interesting issues that arise. I’m not proclaiming myself as the next George Morris of western, but I do think my students are starting to speak for themselves–having three individual national western qualifiers last year certainly helped both my confidence and my resume. Obviously I learn new things every day–already this semester I have one extremely challenging group in a class and I am forced every day to try to come up with new ways of getting them to learn. I have another class that is my absolute favorite to teach–we work on the horses themselves rather than just the way the students sit on them. I see improvement not just in the horses but the horsemanship and confidence of the riders–that is enough thanks for me.

Kait, whom most of my readers know as the mastermind behind The Thoroughbred Chronicles, also keeps a personal blog for her business at Thunder Crest Performance Horses. Her recent entry about teaching styles sparked my interest: I could see both my strengths and my weaknesses outlined in her discussion, whether that was what she intended or not. A discussion is starting to take place in her comments which I don’t feel the need to repeat, but I do encourage you all to give her argument a read-through and add commentary of your own.

I do wonder, as I mentioned in my own comment at Thunder Crest, how many of these teaching styles are based in the English disciplines. The old master George Morris, for all of his excellent ideas, teachings, coachings and plain hard evidence that he is the best around, seems to have also made an allowance for the elitist attitude that the trainer knows all and the student is an idiot who is lucky enough to come worship at the trainer’s altar. Perhaps that’s harsh and a little too extreme, but that’s my current perception. Truth? The western trainers I have worked with albeit are not big people teachers but horse trainers, but I much prefer their method of “go try it, then come back, we’ll talk about it, I’ll show you something new, and you go try it again.” That’s how I prefer to teach; that’s how I think I am teaching. (Students, if you’re reading this, please weigh in.)

It’s worth it to consider adding a teaching evaluation to each class. I certainly want to improve. I want my students to be the best they can be because it does me justice as a horsewoman myself. I can’t know what to work on if no one tells me…so perhaps we need to ask the right questions.

In the meantime, I would like to think that in the world of teaching riding, I am swimming rather than sinking–thanks in large part to the Alfred University equestrian center for taking me on.

Micro Monday

Today I felt like getting dressed up: took the tail bag off Playgirl and let down her hair, and added white polos to her hind legs–I was intending to work on stops a little harder and needed the hind leg protection anyway.

She felt great. We worked our way through some of her best lead changes ever and she felt cadenced and balanced despite (or perhaps because of) the deep footing. I glanced across at the mirrors during one of her better moments and saw reflected there the horse she could be, the horse she was starting to become. I talk about selling her if the right offer comes along: but in moments like this I want to see her through, to make her a bridle horse, a living testament that I can do this.

Being old

“Can you fix this for me?” one of my varsity riders called to me from across the warm-up pen. She gestured vaguely to her stirrup.

“What’s the magic word?” I teased, striding through the organized chaos of the arena as fifteen horses circled like vultures.

“Please,” she giggled back. (I love this student, she always–ALWAYS–thinks I am hilarious. Either that or she’s very good at laughing at me while making me feel good about myself.)

“Darn kids,” I pretended to grumble as I reattached her stirrup collar. “So rude these days.”

“Right, ’cause you’re so old,” laughed another student, mounted nearby and overhearing the exchange.

“I have gray hairs ’cause of you guys!” I protested with a laugh of my own. It was true. I had one which developed shortly after taking the job as assistant western coach, and, not believing the old wives’ tale, plucked it. I now have three. The tales are true.

By the numbers, I am not old. I am twenty-three. I don’t feel old, or look old (I hope.) I occasionally act old (I blame this on the Alfred Knitting Studio) but such moments can be forgiven, I think. Every now and then, however, something happens to make me feel like a gray-haired old lady. I know this post is going to be greatly amusing to some people, such as mother and all of my mother’s friends who also read this–I am not calling you old, just pointing to the truth that you are, in fact, a little bit older than I am and are probably going to think this whole thing is hilarious.

Location: the Wegmans meat cooler. I am examining the selections of stew beef like any other self-respecting old lady when I hear giggling right behind me. I turn around to see two of my Western I students with a shopping cart loaded with organic products, clearly surprised to see me there. We exchange greetings and they continue to giggle.

“I am a real person, you know.”

“It’s just like…when you see professors in a store…you forget they’re people!”

Lovely. Okay, so maybe this is not an example of my students thinking I’m old, just my students thinking I am some sort of extension of the equestrian center, a function rather than faculty.

As I write this, my cat (obligatory for being an old lady!) snoozes away behind me. I am drinking a glass of wine. I just got done eating a cheese plate (totally required if I want to be a snobby wino) I am burning a candle. I’m keeping a blog. If these aren’t warning signs of impending old age, I don’t know what is.

But–I found myself looking at dark clouds in the distance today as I waited for Sage to stop eating a leaf and instead focusing on going potty. I remembered in that moment a night two years ago when I lived at Ford Street in the campus apartments, a dark night in late April or early May, just a few weeks before commencement. Thunderstorms were dotting the radar of the area–typically storms came into the valley from over Alfred State, raged over both schools and the village, and moved on. This evening, from what we could see of the sky, storms were all over–most of them missing us, but passing by close enough to see the lightning and hear the thunder.

Inspired, my friend Mhari (an odd but charming little girl from Wales) and I scurried across the flat roof of the Leadership Center, ducked under the guardrail and then climbed/crawled up the steep roof to the very top, the front edge of the building dropping sharply away beneath us. We sat there, our bare legs dangling over the edge, bathed in the orange glow of the sidewalk lights below, illuminated from above and around every few seconds with a dull flash of lightning in the clouds. We sat and watched the clouds move, whispering and giggling to each other with the nerve of our daring, smelling with each breath the scent of rain that did not fall. In retrospect, this was one of the handful of times I broke a rule while an undergrad.

Do I wish now that I had broken more rules, been more daring, gotten in trouble? Not exactly; I don’t like having regrets (no one does.) Now, though, living as a teacher in a college town comes with its own set of unwritten rules–I cannot be in certain bars at certain times. I cannot have students over at my house (within reason…this one I have been pushing.) I cannot date students (don’t tell, but obviously I broke that one last year…Peter was a year behind me in undergraduate) I’m sure that I am no longer supposed to be climbing onto the roof of the Leadership Center to watch thunderstorms roll in.

I often wonder in the WILD committee meetings exactly what my new peers think of me–not in the insecure and hopeful way that I hope they think I am doing a good job, but a curiosity, wondering if they think of me as their contemporary or as some new interloper–either a fresh face or a student upstart who just happened to get lucky. I don’t let my musings get in the way of being productive with them, though I still find it funny that I am the head of a subcommittee allowing me to delegate work to the Dean of Students; nor do I let my hang-up on age difference stop me from small talk and banter before and after (and during, if we’re going to be fair) meetings. Nancy continues to host Pictionary nights (though she is my boss and twenty-plus years my senior) in which we hang out with Tammy, the mother of one of our senior IEA riders, and drink lots of wine and be silly. Sometimes she invites Cathie, the incredibly sharp, witty, sassy and intimidating head of the Wellness Center. These gatherings have become the normal monthly Friday crew. It’s fun. I feel privileged to know these people, to be on a good footing with my boss that we can hang out and be silly and then continue a professional relationship. What else would I be doing on a Friday? I don’t feel quite like I could be doing what other twenty-three-year-olds are doing, but sometimes it would be nice to know I could go out to the bar and get a drink and not worry about what my students would think if they walked in (see Alone in Academia.)

I don’t think that I missed out on some epic part of being a college student. Sometimes, though, I wish I was allowed to act a little more my age. I’m not that old after all. I’m not much older than my students. In expectation, however, I am in that vague category known as “adult,” and in Alfred, that means not breaking the rules. I will watch the clouds roll by, but I will watch them from the ground, not high up in the air, feet waving in a restless breeze, a friend at my side, the two of us laughing, effortless, untouchable.

My wild honeymoon stallion

Lakewood called back today. Tres’ tests came back with normal gelding levels. He’s not a stallion…he’s just a jerk.

Fun times ahead. My season of the wild honeymoon stallion begins.

 

While you’re mulling that one over, check out Horse Nation, one of the funniest and most addictive horse websites I’ve ever come across. The recent entry about the Scottsdale liberty classes had me in stitches. It’s totally worth it as long as that excellent faux-sitar techno music is playing the entire time. (Hint: turn your speakers up.)

‘Tis also the season to shop for horse blankets and stock up for next winter–most online stores (and regular stores!) are having massive blanket clearances. I look forward to Monday, on which I get to run through the barn with a clipboard taking stock of our collection of dilapidated horse clothing.

Horse stalking

We’re all guilty of it, all of us “horse people.” Drive by a farm, barn, equestrian center, outdoor arena or farmer’s pasture–if there’s a horse in it, we will practically careen off the road to oogle a closer look. I found myself eyeing my rearview mirror the other day after passing a stock trailer, curious to see–what? A vertical ten inches of horsey hind end between the bars of the trailer? But I needed to see it. I will stare the same way at show trailers on the opposite side of the highway, though  know full well that I won’t be seeing any part of the occupant at all. It’s some addiction that I can’t seem to fight. I pass the same pasture on my way to work every morning and every morning I crane my neck to look up the hill until I find the Percheron driving team that lives there, typically basking in the sun like potted plants.

Fat old horses standing in the shade of a tree in the summer, tails swishing at invisible flies; dirty long-haired horses standing in muddy lots next to peeling barns in the middle of winter–it’s not like I’m constantly laying eyes on last year’s NRHA Futurity champion or the stunt double for Shadowfax galloping around his private paddock (though if he lived nearby, you know exactly where my eyes would be straying.) No, our equine voyeurism is not limited to the most beautifully turned-out steed in the barn. Sometimes they’re not even horses–I stared openly and hungrily at a mud lot of mules two days ago as I drove by. Heaven help me when I drive into Amish country.

Why? What weird desire possesses us to press our noses and palms against the glass and stare? They’re just horses, for goodness’ sake. I am surrounded by them all day. I have spent fifteen years with them. They’ve now become my job, my career, my lifestyle. I know of no other job in which what I do in my time off is the same thing I do in my time on the clock.

My coworker Rebecca and I were driving from a neighboring town after a rousing trip to Tractor Supply. Our route passed by the home of one of our barn assistants who seems to be building a bit of a horse collection–nothing fancy, just a few trail-type horses he finds for cheap or rehomes out of pity. They were all standing with their heads up, ears alert, looking towards the house. Perhaps our friend was coming out to feed or turn in–we’ll never know. Yet we stared as we drove by, his collection of old nags transformed into something lovely with the simple addition of lifted heads and ears, staring into the distance.

It’s that old obsession, that driving force that keeps us going every day to the barn in any condition. It’s the same force that gets us back into the saddle again. It’s the same force that finds solace in the eyes of the horse, the quiet whuffle of recognition, the velvet of a muzzle.

It’s the reason that when Rebecca and I are turning horses into the indoor for a little playtime, we always stop and watch them kick up their heels, roll in the dirt, box each others’ halters, buck, rear, run and wheel about. It’s the reason that no matter how tired we are at the end of the day, we always stop to watch a horse run across the pasture. It’s the reason that it’s not just a job but a passion. Horses are our lives now, for better or worse–but mostly for better.