Health...

Baby pygmy goats in San Luis Obispo - hard to believe how adorable they were - and super small, they were barely bigger than a pug!

Today was Nancy's birthday. I think she would have been 62? We've been missing and thinking about her even more lately.

Her close family member, "Aunt Jeanne", went into hospice care this week. She lives in the Pasadena area and has no recollection of her family and friends any longer. It's very hard to imagine what that would be like - both for her, and for her family and friends!

My friend Leticia had surgery today for cervical cancer. She's younger than I am! Surgery went well and it's likely she will not need radiation treatment after but that is yet to be determined. If you're reading this, Leticia, know that I am praying for you!

I have a cold, and am feeling pretty sorry for myself, but the reality of true health is so much bigger than this. I am sore from riding and working, but I am grateful because it means I was able to do both.

I wanted to post a philosophical entry about this, but I find I am tired and the words are escaping me. Seems that others have said it better already anyway. So my wish and point in posting this is to remind myself and others to value and nurture their health!

Misc

Here's a random update on the happs. Mario did a mentorship with another PHCP mentor on Wednesday. He will probably post to the blog about it so I'll leave that to him, but I do have to say it was really weird to head off trimming by myself that day... knowing that he was trimming too - without me!? I was very proud of him though!

The horses have of course kept me on my toes as usual with transitioning to a new place. Jordan's eye had a really bad flare up. There was one day where it looked like his eye had been replaced with a big white opal. GAH!! That called for a vet visit, and I learned my old vet doesn't travel to the new barn. So we had a new vet, another transition. ;-p He also kicked/struck at a neighbor and got his hoof caught on some fencing, so we had to remove that fencing and today will be putting up a heavier gaege "stud fence" to make sure my prince and princesses don't hurt their wittle selfs.

Faith had a meltdown yesterday - we suspect from the drama of the ranch moving part of their cattle herd near to her paddock, about 200 cattle moo'd their way by and she worked herself into a total tizzy as a result. Jordan was very irritated by Faith's behavior and made several attempts to place himself in ways that would stop her incessant pacing behavior. Hope seemed to be doing it too maybe, although definitely to a lesser degree. I find it fascinating that Faith was not drawing comfort from the fact that neither her herd, her people or the other pasture horses were the least bit disturbed by the cattle. Always the one to teach me new things, that Faith...

Hope seems to be doing the best, she's fairly relaxed and seems content. Unfortunately her knee is still bothering her so I can't ride her. I did ride Jordan for the first time and other than neighing his head off for his women the whole time, he was a very good boy.

I had a very long day in San Luis Obispo on Friday and had to leave the house at 7am - when I woke up I had a very bad sore throat which has since turned into a full blown cold. Saturday I got up at 5am and went to L.A. to watch Debbie McDonald, a US olympic dressage medalist, give a clinic. It was wonderful, worth the lack of sleep and sniffling for certain to be able to learn from her and spend the whole day/evening with my friends Katie and Jennifer. We spent the day at the clinic and then had drinks and a light dinner before heading home. I unfortunately didn't take a single picture of the clinic / riders itself, but here's a shot of the arena it was held in. Nice huh? The view directly across from the arena looks out over all of the L.A. valley!

I have today off and am trying to catch up on the 12,000 things hanging over my head. I feel like I'm moving through a pool of molasses with this cold!

Here's a pic Mario took of a beautiful filly that was just a week old. I trim her mom, and will some day trim this little one's feet. Her name is Moulin Rouge. :)

Hello, Aliso

Today went surprisingly smoothly, all things considered.

We started off the day with a stop at the local coffee shop on the way to the new barn, and I had a delicious English breakfast tea latte and a raspberry scone. Yum! We unloaded the hay and cleaned up the paddock and set out piles of hay before heading to SHI to get the girls. Of course it seemed like absolutely everybody was at the barn! So much for trying to sneak away.

Hope and Faith loaded very nicely but I could hear Hope's neighbor, Willy, calling to her as we pulled away and it was breaking my heart! We learned that a horse at the barn had recently been put down, and another one sold that I remembered when she was born, and all the memories and emotions...ahhH! Before we hit the end of the driveway I was dripping tears. It wasn't that I was regretting the decision to go, just ... melancholy I guess.

However when we got to Aliso the mares unloaded into their new paddock without fanfare and seemed to settle very quickly to eating the hay and checking out their new digs. Hope in particular was fascinated by the big water trough. I watched her take probably a dozen little drinks. I think she liked the idea of having access to the large amount of water at a time. At SHI she had an automatic waterer which refills a small basin whenever she drank it down below a certain point. We watched them for awhile, unpacked all of their supplements, met the manager's assistant and ran into a few of my clients. Finally we headed back to SHI to pick up Jordan.

I was shocked and pleasantly surprised by the interactions between the three horses once they were all together. There was a lot of squealing on the girls parts, but no aggression by anyone! Jordan was more interested in asserting his dominance over the neighboring horse trio's leader, and there was some rearing and posturing over the fence. Eventually Hope, Faith and Jordan were galloping around a bit, and when Jordan got too close to Faith she planted a hoof in his chest. Oof! Look, you can almost see her frog! :-P

I couldn't believe how much movement was going on. All 3 of them were moving from one hay pile to the next, to the water, back to the hay, to the 3 neighbors watching curiously from the fence, to me, back to the hay, etc. And through all of it I was truly impressed with how well my horses were getting on. I don't know who surprised me the most!!

We came home for awhile and then went back around 6 or 7pm to give supplements and make sure they were still doing well. Supplement time is going to be a challenge, because of Hope. She's a slow picky eater with her vitamins. At Sporthorse she would eat a little and then come back to them over the course of many hours. At Aliso, Jordan and Faith will just come over and eat whatever Hope left behind. I have no ideas at this point on how to remedy the problem. Any thoughts are very welcome!!!

Anyway, I'm exausted and have a full day's work tomorrow before I can get back out and see how they are doing. I hope all goes well!! :)

Good bye, Sporthorse

Today was my last official day at SHI. Feels really weird - alot of memories and history there. I really 'grew up' as a horsewoman there! I sat on Faith's back for the first time, fell off her and had to go to the hospital too! I showed Hope to a 2nd level Region 2 championship with the help of my trainer there. I got Jordan from the barn owners, and experienced for a brief while the excitement and hassle of owning a stallion. I gave Nancy pony rides on Hope... one of the first places she went after her final hospitalization was to "the barn", where we have photos of her enjoying the sun on her face and a bottle of root beer. :) The concept of "wine night" was introduced to me through my group of night riding friends, especially Kristen and Jennifer. Wine night evolved from sharing a glass of wine while chatting about our rides, to "No Sex in the Country" where we spent hours each Sunday afternoon/evening sharing a bottle of two of wine, cheese, crackers, olives, guacamole, chocolate, etc. (whatever we had each brought!) talking about our horses, careers, love lives, etc. I am happy to say that even while that was happening, I knew it was a fleeting time in the big scheme of life and tried to capture it in my memory as the happy time it was. I still recall one night around the table there, telling my friends how excited and into this "natural hoofcare" thing I was. ;-)

Over the years, Sporthorse has been my 2nd home. ...Sigh...

Tomorrow the horses and Mario and I will embark on our next adventure and I will definitely keep you posted.

Back from NY

My trip to the AHA conference was great. It was 8am to midnight every day, with analysis, discussion and debate in between. We trimmed, observed, learned. I personally learned so much from everyone there! One of the members, a woman named Sue from Vermont, really drove home the point of being intensely observant. When I got home I had an epiphany that observing something that intently requires one to be in the moment. Being in the moment in this case means not thinking about where the horse was, what his feet used to look like, what I want them to look like, what the owners think, etc. It means being in the now. When you are observant and in the now, you really SEE things, and this leads to gratitude. Living in gratitude is bliss. :) See, trimming horse feet just like anything else can be a spiritual way of being.

I took these pics of these plants growing near one of the places where I trimmed on Monday after getting back from NY. I thought these looked like little fairy cups! The stripey plant was a huge weed with a cool pattern. The purple flowers were teeny, but everywhere, very pretty. Who knew I would be so into plant photography?? ;-)

I've been trimming and dealing with all kinds of *stuff* since I got back. Frustrating clients, exciting changes for some horses. Bills and organization (or lack of). I've been preparing my horses for the move this weekend by trying to get them used to each other. I somehow have to fit in all my trimming, phone calls, ordering boots and misc items, emails to clients, promises to ship things out and explain things and blah blah with buying hay and a storage unit for it of some kind and actually moving them by Sunday.

Hope everyone out there is doing well. I see my fellow bloggers are busy doing non-computer things as well! ;-) To anyone I owe an email - I will get to it eventually I promise!

Bookends

Logan and Luna

We used to tell them apart because Logan was so much bigger than Luna when we first got them, but now they are both so fat (!) we have to see their faces to know who is who. Logan is cross eyed! I had to grab this pic because they were even laying in the same position. :)

Today is my last day before leaving to NY for the AHA conference. I can't believe I will be so close to family and not see anyone, but the trip is 100% full with meetings, clinics and even planned dinners. I am sharing a rental car with a trimmer from NorCal, and we are staying in one of the other member's houses - so I won't even have any 'down' or alone time at all. I am a little nervous about that actually, but I am sure it will all work out fine. I still can't believe I am a certified AHA trimmer in the first place!