Did you ever read the series of books that started with “The Black Stallion” written by Walter Farley? If you haven’t, I highly recommend them. They revolve around a deep bond between a stallion called the “Black” and a boy named Alec. These books were some of my absolute favorites growing up. I always dreamed of being like Alec – having that big beautiful and oh so very fast horse that would only let me ride him.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Black_Stallion
Granted, I didn’t really think through the logistics. Can you imagine the nightmare of being shipwrecked on a desert island with only a horse for company? This is the foundation of their relationship in the Black Stallion. But, that’s a kid’s brain for you! Have you ever seen one of those survival shows like Survivorman or Alone? If so, you probably realize how unpleasant that situation would be. However, the fact that Alec had this deep connection with this amazing horse was the stuff of past Kerrie’s dreams (okay, present Kerrie too).
Practically speaking, having a horse who won’t allow anyone else near him, is hard to handle, and is a stallion is not actually an enviable situation. Let’s be honest here, I don’t want to be the only one who can muck my horse’s stall or turn him out or change his blanket. That’s terrible, dangerous, and I’m kind of lazy so I don’t want to do all that work myself.
There is something so very appealing about being the only person that a horse trusts to ride it though, isn’t there?
I am pretty sure that I have the horse who is the closest you can get without having a full on dangerous horse that everyone hates. Enter the.. Gray Gelding!
My horse, Prophet, came from a fairly bad situation. He came to the barn underweight, with Lyme Disease, dangerously low vitamin E levels, with rain rot, and sporting a bad attitude. He was not a friendly horse and would bite and kick and rear and buck and bolt and back into ditches. I will talk about all of those things in later blog posts but, for now, I will just say that it took a long time, a lot of patience, a lot of medical and chiropractic care, and a lot of persistence to get him to where he is today. On the ground he is now friendly, sweet, calm, and very easy to work around. He’s a barn favorite and we are often asked to accompany nervous horses or riders on trail rides to help them build confidence. He’s sometimes even referred to as “Uncle Prophet”. However, the one area where he is not the easiest horse to work with is riding.
Other people can get on him and he doesn’t do anything dangerous, but he is very clear about that fact that the person on his back is NOT MOM. There isn’t really any room for interpretation as you see his ears pin back and his whole body tense. He suddenly can no longer do normal horse things like walking or steering. Obviously, this is because I am the best rider in the world and he recognizes this and responds to my extreme skill level.
Ha! Just kidding. It has nothing to do with my super-fly extra awesome riding skillz (yes, that’s skillz with a z). What it does have to do with is trust. He trusts that I will not hurt him or put him in a situation where he is unsafe. We spent months and months building this trust and we still are building upon it to this day, more than 5 years after our first ride (which I think could have qualified me for my pro-rodeo card in the bronc riding event).
Check out the resemblance – it’s uncanny! (Good thing I labeled the photos, huh?)
Happy Trails!
Kerrie
I ♡ this!