Recurring themes

I am about to make a public volte face with regard to my feelings towards Facebook.  Despite sustaining a deep urge to turn every event in my life into a status update-worthy soundbite, I now regard the whole set-up with something approaching awe and wonder.

As more people are online, having become “Facebook friends” with their immediate circle, they must all be thinking (as I am):  “What happened to so&so?”  Motives for doing this are many and various, from the genuinely concerned to the slightly more vicious (me too!).  However, the long-term result of this is that genuine friendships that had expired for genuine/circumstantial reasons have been rekindled.  This leads me to the awe-and-wonder part, where I seem to be existing in many of my own time zones simultaneously… and I never was any good at physics.

The most recent provocation of this sense has come from seeing pictures of the horses, stables and people from where I first learnt to ride.  As I am in none of these pictures, I can’t have figured heavily in these other people’s pasts, but seeing them transported me back vividly to my own childhood.  And funnily enough, many of the old friends I have encountered on Web2 share the equine connection!

Straight from the horse’s mouth.

I write this with the sound of hoofbeats still echoing through my body.

There was a joyous half-term with 3, yes 3 rides (a lesson, a great hack, a gentle schooling session) on one pony,  and  the feeling of getting a genuine connection with an equine.  Following hard on its heels came last week, when the share agreement came to a somewhat abrupt end.

However, with some renewed confidence in my ability as a rider, I headed off to a local show to borrow someone else’s horse, a 16.3hh IDxTB.  After only just clapping eyes on him, we managed to jump in four classes with no fences down – he was a total star.  Not only was the riding good, I met some other local horse-owners, one of which has kindly offered me a ride on her three horses!

One is a pony mare who is very pretty, bags of star quality, still needs some schooling; another is a true “wonder pony” – twenty-something and still going strong.  The third is responsible for the echoing hoofbeats in my soul – an ex-racer, who gave me the most sublime gallop up a field about 10 minutes away from where I live.

Fingers crossed that this one works out – their owner is lovely, welcoming and generous with her horses.

No pictures of these horses as yet, but will work on that for next time.  In the meantime, it gives me a chance to fondly remember Merlin!