My Hollywood moment. Many of you know Cupcake, my husband's 17.3 H Percheron/Ap. Well, he had decided to quit riding due to far too much back pain so I am now trying to make him into a Derby horse. He loves to jump, far too much, so it should be a good match. Speaking of jumping.....this time of year Cup tends to get a bit bored. He is a very lucky boy as with this balmy weather we have had in NH this Nov. he has been able to stay with his little herd in their summer pasture where the grass is still green and there is plenty of room to run. Still, the boy does have an adventurous spirit and sometimes it gets the better of both of us.
The other day I went out early to put them in their paddock and decided to go down to the "pond" field to see if I might find the halter he lost. I put it on when he started going on walk about. His field buddies, Azeem, the 22 year old bay Morgan, Calypso and Rhumba, the Hanoverian/T'bred sisters were in a state. They saw me crossing the stream thru the woods and came running up to me, whinnying...."Cup is out, Cup is out...we don't know what to do!" Within feet of me the three slid to a stop and couldn't tell me fast enough that Cup was on the other side of the fence and I needed to help them get their fearless leader back. (Azeem was probably trying to tattle on him and saying "See what a pain he is, he got out again.") There he was, trotting up and down the old road on the other side of the fence. Silly boy. I promised to get him back and walked over toward the fence to access the situation. At that point Caly, who gets VERY unnerved when Cup is not near headed toward the fence as if to jump it. I backed off, very quickly. Did not need two horses out! So, I thought, perhaps I can get them up to the barn and fence them in the paddock and THEN go get the errant big boy. I called the obedient three to me and they came running. "What shall we do? What are you going to do? Tell us, tell us!" They trotted beside me, would go a bit ahead then toss their heads and fall back in line behind me. The stream crossing is very narrow and not a place I want to be with three large horses in a stir behind me so I sent Azeem across and Rhumba followed. But Caly hesitated. "Cup, what are we going to do with Cup, I can't cross without him!" Bother I thought. But just as I thought my whole plan would blow apart there, up on the hill at the far gate, stood a large white mammoth. Caly saw him and decided I was quite brilliant. My take. They all galloped up the hill to join their leader. I am only second in their eyes. The amazing part of this whole story, apart from how much my horses trusted me to make the right decision was that Cup had to go down the old dirt road, through the woods then turn up the hill in the overgrown field and come to the gate at the top of the hill. It is not a straight shot, and I am not sure he has done that trip with me on him more than once or twice. So Hollywood, when you want to be impressed by horses check out some back yards. There are amazing things happening there.
