I know this sounds like there's an 8-year-old girl stuck inside my body controlling my every move, but I can't help it: I love ponies.
I was one of those kids who begged my parents to get a horsey when I was growing up (despite the fact that we could walk the periphery of our backyard in less than 30 seconds, and that at Californian walking speeds.) When I went away to summer camp in the mountains, my favorite feature was the horse rides. We rode Western saddles and took rides up the trails to the mountaintops. It was magical.
I went back to that camp throughout my childhood and into my adolescence. By the time I stopped going, I considered myself a fairly accomplished rider--not by professional standards, you understand, just by the standards of almost-everyone-else-I-know-has-never-been-on-a-horse-and-I-have-never-fallen-or-had-a-problem.
Hey, it was mine.
By the time I finished high school, my parents started taking us on vacations where trail riding on horseback was a little more common of a feature. I could not have been more thrilled. With every ride I felt more confident, more accomplished, and certainly far, far superior to my family members.
Then, when I was 19 and home from college for the summer, my family and I stayed at a cabin somewhere. I forget if it was Yosemite or Mammoth or where exactly, but there was a horsebacking trail opportunity nearby and we took advantage. The guide asked us all about our experience, to which most of my family had none to speak of, but the guide was pretty impressed when I detailed my experience. So she put me on this one particular horse that usually only the guides themselves rode. For some reason the guide didn't want to ride this horse today, and she said she thought I could handle him.
I can't remember the names here, so for the sake of argument let's call the horse Buck (you can already tell where this story is going, can't you?) The guide Sarah (another made-up name) chose to ride this docile, submissive-type horse, who we'll call Jane. She put me on Buck.
Now Buck was huge, the largest horse I'd ever ridden. What he had in size he more than matched in attitude and pushiness. He was known to bully the other horses, never to cause pain or be sadistic, just sort of a pack-leader mentality.
There was only one rule: No one goes in front of the guide and no one falls far enough behind that they could not hear Sarah when she talked.
So up the trail we went. Sarah started out on Jane, and Buck immediately fell into step behind. My parents, two brothers and sister followed. We'd barely made it out of the yard and onto the trail before Buck started nudging at Jane's hindquarters and back legs, nipping at them, trying to push her out of his way so he could take the lead. I pulled him back at times, and other times, where the trail was wide enough, let him pull up almost alongside Jane, but still slightly behind, so he could give release so some of his attitude.
Towards the end of the trail and the top of the mountain, the trail narrowed so the horses had to go in single-file. It became rocky and very, very steep. Buck backed off easily and let Jane go up first to the top of the mountain to the look-out point.
I remember it was beautiful. I remember we could see a sun-dappled valley for miles. I remember that to see the almost nothing man-made, except for the trail we'd followed up the mountainside. I remember that it was gorgeous.
On the way back down that steep, narrow, rocky trail, Buck's patience ran out. He moved to Jane's left, off the trail, finally determined to get ahead of her once and for all. He knew Jane was too timid to try to get ahead of him again when there was no room for them both to walk astride.
He made it about three steps--long enough for me to realize what was happening and say, "Uhh, Sarah?" before Buck fell over. With me still on top of him.
There was about a quarter of a second between me being in perfect health and having my left leg crushed between the rocks and an animal that weighed over a ton. Maybe a quarter-second more before my head crashed against those self-same rocks.
Somehow my training from those days back in summer camp--to keep the reins and your seat straight and upright--kicked in. I tugged on him and Buck regained his balance and got back to his feet. He got back onto the trail and into line, and though I could tell he still wanted to get in front of Jane, he wasn't going to try again while we were still on the narrow part of the trail. And my blood pressure couldn't stand it.
As soon as the trail became somewhat even again, I told Sarah I couldn't ride him anymore. We traded horses, but my panic still did not soon subside and I eventually had to turn my reins over to Sarah and let her lead Jane on from her perch on Buck.
I had nightmares about it for days. I didn't go near horses again for years. Until Thursday.
My friend Leila rides a few times each week, and while I was staying with her I went to watch her ride. After her Thursday lesson ended, the trainer let me ride around the yard for about 10 minutes. The trainer kept one hand on the reins, but I held them in the back.
I have to admit, it wasn't as scary as I'd expected, despite the fact that I was using an English saddle (if you don't know the difference, a Western saddle makes you feel like you're in one of those howdahs that you see in Indian art on top of elephants. Now, imagine going from that to something more akin to a high-wire act. And that's the difference between a Western and an English saddle.) Balance is much more essential. Your stance is incredibly different. The directions and way you interact with the horse is different. It's like learning to ride all over again--which, with how long it's been since the last time I got onto a horse, isn't an entirely out-of-place simile.
But I enjoyed it a lot. I'm not about to start riding competitively or anything, but it felt good to put this long-lasting fear of mine somewhat to rest again, and to literally get back onto the horse. In a weird way, it's made the rest of what this trip's all about a little easier to deal with.
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