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We Are Flying Solo

November 2, 2010

Dressage Is For Haters

The warmup arena closest to my ring was on a slight slant. I knew as soon as we took our first few trot strides downhill that I should have done the hock injections sooner.

Lesson 5: Always listen to your gut.

Solo wasn't off, but I could feel that he just wasn't as willing to really push from behind and support his weight like he had been doing. Thank you, universe, for making sure that, so far, we never get to compete recognized at 100% capacity.

I worked on suppling and transitions, but perhaps we have been doing the transition thing too much -- Solo anticipated all of the upward transitions and flung his head around in annoyance. I threw my dressage whip in the grass, which improved matters a little. All the while, I boiled with frustration inside. In true adult fashion, I mentally screamed at innocent bystanders: Stop looking at me! I am a psycho.

His dressage work has been beautiful at home. Even 80% of what he has been doing would have been great. But the confines of the stall and the cold snap were too much for Friday morning's Adequan shot to overcome.

A steward trotted down to the ring, loudly looking for 241.

"That's me," I said.

"We have been looking for you!" she called. This girl was about 15 or so.

WTF? Again?? Am I doomed to never actually get a helpful warmup steward who does their job and lines up people on deck???! "I'm sorry," I replied, "but no one is giving us information down here."

"Oh," she says, "there is no steward because this is not an official warmup area."

I look blankly back over my shoulder at where we had been warming up: a harrowed, watered, PREPARED surface with about six or seven horses and riders prepping for their tests. Sure as hell looks like a warmup area to me.

I shake my head and walk up to the ring. I greet the judge and enter after she rings the bell.

We put down our test. It doesn't feel very good. Solo is a bit resistant, especially since the first half of the test tracks left, his weak side. Once we go right, he softens a bit. I try to keep up the energy but he is dead slow in medium walk and breaks to trot several times in anticipation, the bugger. I salute at the end, thank the judge and leave.

I am near tears of frustration and fury, not all of which is completely explainable. There might have been a hormone surge in there somewhere too. But I am so angry that all of our hard work with such positive results seems to disappear as soon as we step in a warm up arena.

As I put Solo back in his stall to rest for a bit before show jumping, I am overwhelmed by hopelessness.

I want to just pack up and go home. I hate this. Why do I do this? This is ridiculous -- I am here by myself, trying to do forty jobs at the same time and I am failing at all of them in this huge place. What is the freaking point?

Lesson 6: Don't skip breakfast. It then means I have low blood sugar, which means that I am crabby, impatient, and moody.

I resolve to go watch a few stadium rounds before I get ready to show jump. I need to calm the heck down. As I settle into the bleachers to watch the first round, I glance at my watch. It is 1:20 pm. I am a five minute walk from my barn and I am supposed to ride my stadium round at 2:02 pm. Like, in 40 minutes.

My head explodes anew and I slam through the auditorium doors in a mad race for stabling.

This is not going well.

2 comments:

  1. Drama! Geez, you and Solo are like your own little episode of Real Hosewives. ;-) Fortunately, drama makes for very interesting reading.

    Hopefully, you guys worked the kinks out and were rockstars in SJ and XC (and, let's face it, THOSE are the reasons you event, afterall -- dressage is "like watching cement set," as they say in Sylvester).

    I highly suggest breakfast and a few shots of alcohol the morning of your next event!

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  2. Haha, Frizz, I KNOW! We are jinxed! Next time I am totally stabling next to my friends who make drinks the whole weekend.

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