Sage

11/14/98  Cow Clinic was out on 60 acres of landed divided into three pastures.  A herd of unlucky cows were minding their own business when 22 riders showed up. It was the best clinic that I’ve ever seen or participated. It was 3 days of constant challenge. The 1st two days, we played games and were given tasks to increase those skills needed for working with cows. We played ground games with our horses to get them to get better at backing up and loading the hindquarters so we could…

My friends and I are the only tent people in the whole campground and it's 90+ and humid in the afternoon. All the people with air conditioned rigs head for air conditioned naps after our noon meal. My two traveling companions with their bumper pull trailer head for this tiny little tree and drag their chairs and hover underneath the "wide" canopy of shade provided by a short 2 year old tree. Not me. I drag my extra special Wal Mart air mattress...with the flocked top...out of my tent and…

4/22/1998 Fox hunters wear funny looking coats and those weird pants with long black boots. They ride with the hounds and chase a wee fox. This is my version of a fox hunter from the Ozarks. I've got my rifle, wearing my coon skin cap. I've got my hounds tied to me ...like a field trial and Sage is hidden under a fox pelt, so we can sneak up on brother fox. Oh yes, they are hard to see, but my knee high boots are John Deere bright green and…

I did mention it was hot and humid. Monday was day 4 of being hot and humid all day.  Plus for test day, we were in the arena..where it is even more hot and humid than it is outside. We had a break for lunch. We were all sitting in the air conditioned lounge. Suddenly, I started crying.  I tried to figure out what was happening to me as I was not sad about anything. I decided I must be having heat exhaustion.  I mentioned that to the crowd and all of…

Sage and I have been in a clinic for 3 days with David Lichman. It's been horrid hot.  We've been at it every day from 9:00am to around 4:00 pm.  It's horrid hot and humid. We are surviving. Dave is going to stay over on Monday and is available to assess the level 1.  Here's what I thought.  Hey!  I'll just take the level 1 test.  Maybe I can pass 4 tasks. That would make me happy! Monday comes First is the ground things. Then we get to the saddle…

I'm riding Sage pretty good now.  We are taking a weekly riding lesson with Karen Moulis. It's a very big deal coming up as David Lichman, Parelli Natural Horsemanship advanced instructor is coming to Pine Dell to give a three day level 1 clinic.  It's terribly hot. Day three near the end of the clinic, Dave decides to do the turn and face your fear exercise.  He sets a fire in the big outdoor arena.  We horses and riders group around the fire.  Burning things fly up and we duck. That's…