First lesson on Dude tonight! Was a wee bit crazy because I had to tear home from work to let the dogs out, change, then leap into the car to get to the barn for the 5 pm lesson. I got there around 4:15, so I ran Dude and Bestie out to graze for about 10 minutes each, then got Dude tacked up. He seemed a bit ouchy on his back left hoof when I picked it out. But he had trotted going out to graze and didn't look off. I walked him down the path before heading back to go into the indoor.
When we first went in, there were three other horses in there, so he was all caught up in watching them and tucking in right behind whoever might pass us. The arena had been watered so it was a lot less dusty than yesterday when I lunged Bestie. The other horses left the arena right about the time my lesson started up, so then Dude became focused on the fact that NO OTHER EQUINES WERE IN THE ARENA. He'd stop or pause right by the door the first few times we went around, but we worked through it.
Tonight was a walk night. Fine with me. I haven't had a lesson on him in so long; years, in fact, and Emma's style is very different from those long-ago lessons so I'm happy to start at ground zero. "Turning the key" was step one: just encouraging him to turn by twisting my wrist slightly in the direction I wanted him to turn. Very little movement of my wrist, combined with looking in the intended direction. Amazingly, it worked. I say amazingly, because with Dude I often feel like I need to be heavy-handed because he is such a strong horse. I couldn't believe that such a light touch worked.
We worked on transitions at the walk, halting and starting up again in a relaxed way. Then we went on to serpentining at the walk. Which, if there could have been a line diagram of my route, would've showed the most jagged serpentine ever. No way was it a smooth s-curve; it was more like a series of z's strung together. We had a couple nice smooth curves, but overall, it was pretty crazy. So let's just say I have some things to work on. Which is good. This way I can spend 15 minutes or so in the indoor working on something concrete, then head outside. Or mix it up and do a few minutes before and a few minutes after going out in the field.
The plan was to do a lesson each week, alternating horses. Technically it should be Bestie's turn next week, but I'm going to see how it goes since I just lunged her for the first time yesterday. She looked fine and was amazingly (that word again) well behaved considering she has been off for two months. Tomorrow they are both going out in new turnout situations and I have my fingers crossed. There's been some shuffling around in the fields with a new horse's arrival and horse "issues" and horse personality differences. Dude will be with three other geldings again (different from the geldings he was with before), and Bestie will be with two mares. One of the mares she was with briefly before she got kicked and she had no problems with her, and the other one is supposed to be extremely passive. Gotta say I'm nervous. Can't deal with any more vet bills.
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