Follow Me

I had grand plans to ride today. After all I had homework to do. However, work kept me later than I had planned so I got home much later than I wanted to. I still had time to ride but I was feeling a bit stressed from the drive and my mind was full of 'work stuff'. I realized that I could decide to have a good session working on the ground or hope to have a good ride with my brain not 100% in the game. I decided to do ground work. 

We went into the ring and I had a goal- I wanted to get her working on the lunge. It no longer has to be about relaxation- I can use it for getting her working through and bending. She struggled a bit with the idea that she should trot and bend and attend to me rather then the potential dangers outside. Her idea was that I could ask for 2 of the 3 but requesting 3/3 was really too much. 

I persevered though and soon enough she was actually working through her body and stretching out. I was really happy with her attitude and her work. After I worked her up and down the ring asking her to be the same no matter where we were in the ring I asked her to halt.

I walked up to her and unclipped her lunge line and walked away. She followed right beside me. Right up to troll corner. I spent some time walking around the ring and she stayed right with me. She even backed up when I did. I did a major test of walking to the gate and then away. She hesitated, looked at the gate and with a sigh followed me. I decided that was a way to end it. 

At least in the ring. We walked down to the barn. Every time I walk down to the barn I play with my walk pace and she does perfect of matching my pace. This time I walked down to the barn and kept going. We headed right down to bottom of the field and around the end. She was a alert but stayed with me. when we got down to the bottom she looked around a bit, shrugged and then began to graze. 

On the way back we headed up the driveway. She was fascinated with sniffing it. 

Me: Remember that this was the way you came to the barn when you first arrived. 

Carmen:  It looks and smells different. 

Me: No kidding. 

I really hope it doesn't look like this again

We headed up to the barn and in. Irish was happy to see us. 

Irish: Where did you go? 

Carmen: Do you know how they say that the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence? 

Irish: yes....

Carmen: Well it's true. And it's delicious! 

Irish: Man. That's not fair! 

seems fair to me