dancing horses

dancing horses

Sunday, April 14, 2013

Bravery

Horses are not for the faint of heart. Neither is having your horse at home.

I think that there have been less then 5 times when I have been truly afraid around horses. Adrenalin pumping yes, excited yes, but not really fearful. I have found with Steele that no matter what he's doing around me I can stay calm and cool. This helps him to calm down as well. After all it's no fun if I don't join in. When I could only ride school horses I was often put on the 'new' horses. Not because I am a brilliant rider, I realize now, but because I would stay calm. I found it fun to try to figure out which buttons to push and which to leave alone.

Today Ed and I were going to pick up more hay. Our hay guy told me where it was and told me to go get what I wanted and then pay him later. However, Ed has come down with the flu. So I told him that I would take the truck and get a few bales to tide us over until he felt better. I found the location and the barn. I remember that he told me to 'take the bales on the right'. It is one of those huge barns so common around here. I opened the main doors and went inside. The hay was to the right all right. Except that it was 15 feet up in the loft with a metal ladder being the only way up.

Well crap.

I looked around to see if there were a few bales on the ground floor but nope, there were none. I climbed up the ladder- it rattled as I climbed. Once up to the top I tried to loosen a few but they were jammed in tight.

I climbed down and did some thinking. I had 3 options:
1. go home- give up? NEVER!
2. call Ed and ask him to come out to help. - But he was sooo sick
3. just do it.

I was a wee bit nervous- to do this I had to climb to the top of the ladder, and then move into the loft over the hay bales. If I fell how long before Ed would know I was missing? Then I thought- 'well what would you do if Ed wasn't around? Would you get rid of the horses?

So that decided it. I climbed up to the top, hooked my arm over the wooden beam, grabbed onto a bale of hay (giving a few tugs to make sure it was tight) and hauled myself into the loft. I then threw down the bales, making sure that I moved the ones blocking entry back into the ladder. I then hooked my arm back over the beam, swung back onto the ladder and made my way down.

After I was down, it dawned on me- I hadn't been scared at all. Just careful.

Perhaps my mom shouldn't read this- I'll be in trouble. And I promise that I won't do it without Ed to hold the ladder next time.


5 comments:

  1. You were brave. I often have the same thought process when I need to do something and Brett isn't around. I haven't had to climb up and get hay from a stack like that though. I don't like heights and would have been scared spitless.

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  2. I get bad vertigo, so that would not have been fun. That ladder would have made me sweat like crazy, but I do understand the gumption to "get 'er done" because your horses need the hay. I am impressed!

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  3. You're brave! I'm not terrified of heights, but I'm not fond of them either... that would probably have totally freaked me out though lol. My horses would have been eating hay cubes, hay pellets or really expensive feed store hay lol!!

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