Accept And Be Grateful

While reading a Melody Beattie book I once again made a mental note and wrote the date in a blank space on the page, next to notes I wrote other years.

How do I get to the point I shake my head and say 'Oh yeah', about the same forgotten subject. Then almost as instinct, the mental note turns into pondering of times spent with the herd, here at the ranch.

The morning rides have been amazingly pleasant with the last month's weather. I've so enjoyed the company while out working and playing with the horses, here at Prospect Riding Center. The folks who come out each week have such experience to share. Not sure who I learn more from, the horses or the people!

My 'Oh yeah' moment was after a few rides with Roosevelt. I didn't see his cues, telling me to change something. Those mornings when we are finished with any arena work with the horses, we walk and enjoy nature. He walks out, with such determination and seems to get in the front on trail rides with the other horses, none of which care to take the lead.  I've always felt he's helping me be a better rider with any hours spent in his saddle. He is so demonstrative with some of his actions, I can feel him move under me.

As he relaxes and his long ears begin to flap alternately, you relax with him. That relaxed unison feeling is what I strive for, as if Roosevelt rides into my intent and the vision in my mind. Those times make it worth those other times, when he acts as if there is a predator waiting around a certain pile of palmetto bushes: It is at those time his ears seem three feet long in themselves, never mind the erect neck and stiff body. But ~ all the more reason to be the leader and show him the way to confidently move through his curiosity.

Being encouraged by my fellow riders we tackle the infamous bushes on several more occasions and unexpectedly, WHAM, Roosevelt does an evasive dirty trick. He lowers that shoulder and spins out from under me, leaving me in the dust, he regains his composure a mere ten feet away, and there he waits for me to gather his reins.  Together we go to the closest down tree and up in the saddle we go. I, white knuckled, and he seems as if he got something out of his system and moving on with the trail ride.

Needless to say the next ride was starting a bit white knuckled with the memory of that last ride. Maybe there was something to be afraid of around that bend. Maybe we could avoid it? Instead, I talked to my mule and buried his nose in the hip of his favorite pasture buddy and those ears....they really began to swing. Side by side as if ponied together he walks, but, we just passed the worst bush of palmettos with creepy things hiding that you'd ever seen! We followed in that tandem position nearly all the way home! Weeee Weeeee weeeee, again, another great trail ride with the same tried and true softness on the trail. I learned my mule did not want to go first! I just didn't see the fast walking telling me that.

Accept and be grateful! I accept I'm getting too old to come out of my saddle on a trail ride. Grateful that Roosevelt made his intentions clear and shows what a great mule companion he is. We don't always have to be the leader.