I’m a Libra, you know, the scales.  So it seems every situation in my life I weigh.  I used to make lists with the good on one side and the bad on the other.  Reasons to do things and reasons not to.  (Should that be two oo’s?)  English was not my strong point in school.  Neither was Math, History, Science…… you get the picture.

So my friend with the Thoroughbred, who was having another love/hate day, was at it again last week.  I’ve mentioned he’s a real sweet boy, but still a young TB.  He was spending a lot of time doing airs above ground, cracking his back, and doing hand stands.  It was one of those feel good days.  Now she has been working with him, and when he’s focused he does pay attention and retain.  But it was one of those cool, brisk, kick you heels up, windy kind of days.  I noticed he was on the muscle when I moved him and his friend to another pasture.  I thought, “okay, you’re a horse that is happy and healthy now, have a nice day, and walked away.”

However, ten minutes later his owner shows up expecting the quiet well-behaved horse she left here the day before.  Not!!!  By the time I got back to the barn from the pasture, she had him outside cross tied on the wash rack.  He was prancing and dancing around, it was like he was standing on burning coals.  I told her to bring him in the barn.  She told me that’s where she started, but he was doing the same thing so she thought she would bring him outside so he could see things.  He wasn’t seeing anything, he was inside his head, and his brain was like the flashing lights of a pinball machine.  She tried her normal calming sounds and touches.
At this point he’s spinning around on cross ties.  She tried a stud chain to get his attention.  I told her to cut her losses and turn him back out, she wasn’t going to ride him today, not on my watch.

At that point she was still trying to get his attention to walk him outside.  He wasn’t even interested that I was walking his best friend right there with him.  He was just getting more agitated.  So I was done watching this nonsense.  I told her to give him to me and I walked them both back out to the pasture and turned him loose.  He did just what I thought.  He spun and bucked and took off across the pasture.  She panicked because she saw that kick come too close to me.  I knew he was going to do that, he knew exactly where he was and I was, and never extended his legs.  I did back away in preparation.   At that point I told her that it’s not that she did anything wrong and I did something right, it was a matter of the familiar routine.  A matter of the difference of her energy and mine.

So today we sat and talked.  Today she’s into selling him again.  “He’s not the quiet trail horse I wanted.  I thought I could turn him around.”  Sometimes that works, and sometimes it doesn’t.  We get back to “natured vs nurtured.”  Who he was at birth and what life has done to him.  So I told her she had to weigh all the good thing she likes about him and then the bad things she doesn’t like.  I asked her what she was willing to give up?  Would circles in a ring be alright or is trail riding what she really wants.  She needed to see which out weighs the other.  I know she loves the horse.  She saved him, fixed him, and wants the best for him.  Then I told her there was a compromise.  She could keep him, get the horse she pictured in her mind, and bring them both home so she wasn’t paying double board.  I told her she had to go home and think about what matters most.

Now I know he’d make a fantastic hunt horse.  He’s brave, got a brain, when he doesn’t misplace it, and he’s great with dogs running around his legs.  His problem is he needs a job, and she isn’t physically capable of giving him what he needs.  According to Bob “a good long run full-out.”  But then that’s what Bobby and Toy always needed.

I’m glad it’s her decision.  He’s a sweet boy and I don’t want him to end up in a bad home again.   I’ll miss him, but he needs a life.  She saved him, we fed him, adjusted every bone in his body, got his feet in good condition, and showed him there were people who would take care of his needs.

So now I wait for an answer.  Does he stay?  Or does he go?  It’s up to her.  I mentioned, when she got him, he was not the right horse for her.  With her physical problems she cannot do for him what he needs.  No matter how many times I’ve tried, you just can’t fit a square peg in a round hole, or teach pigs to sing.  It just wastes your time and annoys the pigs.

It’s like a Carousel.  You just keep going around in circles, but at some point you have to jump off.