March 3. Today’s ride was briefly delayed by realizing I had missed taking my meds for 2 days, so a perfect time to check BP and see how it was doing on its own. Hmph. Need to be more regular taking it, was the answer. OK. Tigger blocked Rags from coming to me and presented himself: I want to go first. So he got some simple practice in hand, and sure enough Rags sneaked in behind him and wanted to nibble his tail or nip his flank. Having made Rags stand back while Tigger “worked” and earned a cookie, when I then released Tig and went to Rags…he declined to be caught, challenged Tigger to a chase, and off they went, heads and tails up. They came prancing back, snaking their heads (Tigger does that very well, with an Arabian’s supple neck; Rags…doesn’t.) I caught Rags, haltered him, led him toward the barn and so Tigger of course had to come sniff his tail and his flank. BOYS! Convinced Tig to wait outside the barn while I led Rags in and closed the gate. Got Rags tacked up, with R’s help for tightening the girth the last hole, had no trouble mounting, and then did his “before the ride” pole exercises. I’d moved the poles around yesterday, though I didn’t ride.
We went west along the south fenceline, passing Cloud Pavilion on the south side and turning north along the creek woods. Rags reminded me, with an effort to turn off the trail, that deer had jumped out there on Monday. “Just deer,” I said. “And I haven’t seen one today.” We rode across Center Walk and up the rather crooked trail (for reasons) to the area where trails meet and turned on the one to the creek. “We could go home now,” said Rags with mild resistance. “We’re going across and on, ” I said, encouraging boldness. “A new trail for you.” “Oh…all right…” said Rags’ ears. “If I must.” “You must.”
Dead giant ragweed stalks from the creek west aways make a noisy and slightly prickly obstacle, but Rags quit worrying about the crackling sound soon and we were past the trail that winds around to the right, toward the gully system. He’d never seen this part before. Bigger junipers, a trail that generally rises to the west, but undulates with dips formed by water running off the fields to the north. Then (really visible from on top of a horse, and Rags stared)–the back of a house with a fenced yard, dog, turkeys and other farm critters. More big junipers to go between and around. Rags decided he’d better leave a marker for the way home, and dropped a pile. That trail turns south before getting to the west fence, but it’s visible. We turned the corner and I looked at the junipers ahead…and decided to turn around, because some trimming will make it easier for me when I’m riding. Rags paused to sniff and confirm that the pile on the trail a little ways on was his and not some other horse’s. OK…we’re going home…I could feel the eagerness in his movements…yes, yes, on the way, yes. “Just walk,” I reminded him. “Oh. OK, I guess,” said Rags with a sigh.
Once back on the east side of the creek, I chose the creek woods trail back to Center Walk, and then took him into the Entrance Meadow of the woods, fully mowed at this time. Something moved in the woods behind the meadow–Rags alerted and pointed to it with his nose and ears. “It’s a bird,” I said. “Nothing to worry about.” Rags took a couple more steps and stopped again, this time pointing in the same direction…and we both saw a “something”….mammal with a tail, trotting rapidly southward, into deeper cover. Rags was not at all sure he wanted to be that close to whatever it was. From the brief glimpse, between trees and branches, I think coyote, though not the biggest we’ve seen, or possibly a large fox, though it moved more like a coyote. We circled the little meadow, I showed Rags the woods’ inside trail to the south, but didn’t take him into it (there’s a bit more clearing to do to make it OK for horse riding) and we came out as we’d come in.
Then onto Center Walk, heading toward the Dry Woods corner, where we trotted a ways (I posted, and boy do I need to work on that!), including trotting up and over a terrace berm without any stumbles, until we met a fairly new mowed path that R- had widened for me this week. I slowed him down and turned him into it. It leads from Center walk down to Cloud Pavilion, past patches of tallgrass. Also a new trail for Rags, and he handled it very well, no hesitation. Helps that it’s out in the open, he could see Cloud Pavilion and knows where home is from there. We’ll take it in the opposite direction next time. We turned east again, rode on down to the Old Ditch, then around a corner and through the dip. He was glad to be close and kept breaking to trot (clearly not exhausted!) and wanted to rush to the dismounting area, but I explained (hands, legs, voice, seat) that we weren’t finished yet, and he had to finish up with pole work again. UGH he said by trying to rush, but finally consented to step neatly over the poles, and wind around between them. When he was calm and listening to me, we finished off. It all took about 30 minutes or a bit more, counting the pole work. For his efforts he got a handful of pellets in his dish after being untacked and “backbrushed” to help him dry off…it’s quite warm and dry today with a little breeze. No chance of a chill.
Even though his quick walk was something I liked about him early on, it wasn’t until I really got him out on the land alone, and covering measured distances, that I realized how well he covers ground. He has speeds within his natural walk, but mostly it’s quicker than a lot of horses. Watching him run around with Tigger, I don’t think he’s really ready to canter/lope with a rider…but he’s definitely ready to trot now. Which means starting trotting over poles within a week probably. Not as they’re placed now, but initially laid on the ground a distance apart that lets him trot easily through them.
I love reading about your ponies.
But enquiring minds would like to know if you are writing now?
Marion: I’m sorry you’ve missed the posts and comment responses in which I’ve discussed this before. Short answer: No, I’m not writing on a novel now. The two concussions (late 2017, early 2018), added to the previous ones, resulted in brain damage affecting writing, knitting, physical coordination and balance, and so on. I’ve worked out of much of that, but though I worked hard on the next Vatta novel (although at first I couldn’t write more than short posts and emails, or read at my usual level) until about a year ago. What’s still missing is the ability to concoct a coherent book-length plot. I thought I’d done it but when my agent saw it…no, it wasn’t. Good scenes, no pull-through between them. What I’m trying now is more intensive physical work, to at least recover more of my balance, coordination, and daily writing of shorter pieces, mostly nonfiction, to keep the words-in-motion thing going.
I hope, of course, that the plot daemon will come back, but I have no assurance that it will. (OTOH, the knitting is beginning to come back…slowly. I had lost even the ability to knit a full row of stitches without losing track of which way the yarn should go around the needle, and I still make at least three times as many errors as I used to. I can’t knit very long at a time, or as fast, but I’m making slow progress on two pairs of socks. The test will come soon on one pair, whether I can turn the heels or not.)
Aging is also involved, of course. But I’m back on a horse several times a week, doing things with them daily, and as soon as the body will handle more exercise without putting me down to sleep for hours in daytime, I’ll be back to walk & run sessions as well as riding. I seem to have mounting (with a mounting block) back to near-normal but dismounting is still a battle with my right leg. Progress on general health is slow, but it is progress, and I feel (without formal testing) that elements of cognition are doing better as well. I can read a science or medical journal again and if I have the base knowledge (only in some areas, as I lost at least three years in which it was all gobbledygook) I can follow the logic of the research again. That logic stuff is where plotting long stories lives. I had to re-learn how to read,then how to read fiction (started with children’s books, worked up to Cherryh’s “Foreigner” series the first year) and much of that was learning to follow the logic (which for fiction is both the “outer” logic and the “inner, motivational” logic.) But thinking up that logic so I can use it in a book isn’t yet working. More exercise, more oxygenated blood flow to the brain, more neurons reconnecting, I hope. Still thundering headaches if I push it too far, and still too much exhausted sleep.
I’m lucky. It could have been much, much, much worse. I could be lying here immobile, unable to communicate. The first months, the first year in fact, were scary as hell. The rest of it has just been grinding along trying this and then that, having some things *still* not work and others pop back in with no warning. Maybe I’ll write books again…maybe I won’t. Can’t tell. Would rather talk about the horses and the land and the weather and current events than what I can’t do.
Such a wonderful update, nice to know that Rags is working happily with you.
Rags is amazing, considering that he’s still that young and that green. He would progress faster in training with someone like my trainer Laci, or with a trainer I know online in New Mexico, but he’s able to learn from my less-than-stellar aids so that we’re improving together. Some of what he’s doing is as much for my therapy as his training. Just being on him for a half hour means (for me) a half hour of unbroken concentration…the longer rides and ground-work sessions both. I make a plan for each ride, and though it can change in response to how he works or some scary thing happening, I still am thinking while on him, concentrating on him, on my own seat and use of aids…and that’s good for the brain. So is writing about it when I get back: pushing memory to bring up the sensory details as well as the sequence, rewriting to make it more complete in terms of what happened when, visualizing the trail (and correcting typos and misspellings as I just did twice between parentheses!) When I first started riding him, he stumbled fairly often, sometimes badly, catching his toes on unevenness in the ground or tufts of grass. Part of that was him–his build, his way of going, his lack of practice on natural ground with a rider–and part of that was me, how I was riding. The longer ride yesterday, he did not stumble once. I’m lighter, I sit better, I encourage him to step a little higher (the pole work, among other things like contact.) But he moves better in general, carries himself more ‘together’ except when he’s rushing, and the pole work is starting to help with that.
So a horse that at first I thought might be boring pretty soon is turning out to be delightful…imperfect enough to keep me fully engaged as a rider, but with an attitude and potential ability (limited but still quite a ways to go to reach his limits) that I can enjoy every time I get on him.
Yesterday I was mentally juggling three different clients’ work plus other politics and necessities all at the same time. Huge progress since the days I had to focus on only one task at a time. Of course I also had a hot spot from all that cognition and a headache, but it sort of felt good to be this recovered from the concussions in 2013. And today I didn’t have to rest but ran errands. (Then fell asleep while reading, and should probably take something for the headache I’m fiercely ignoring.) Thank heavens for brain plasticity.
I was reading that music helps a lot of mTBI folks, but I still can’t do music much yet. Brain doesn’t find joy in it. But I’ll work on that next.
So glad you’re nearly at posting!
Elizabeth,
I appreciate your willingness to share about after concussion experiences. I read along with your posts about the book and even though your agent says it’s not a novel, I personally think that those good scenes ought to be published. Even if it is short, unconnected stories you have fans that love you and want to read anything you write! I’ve not done it but I have a friend who self-published on demand with Amazon. Even if you aren’t able to prepare it, maybe someone could help. Please, don’t let that effort be left on a hard drive and never see the light of day.