10 Questions

If you're reading this, it's because nothing is happening and I am too lazy to drum up any substance for a post.

1. What is your biggest source of caffeine that gets you through the day?

Sometimes I also get the most white girl of white girl coffee orders: iced chai latte with skim milk and a shot of espresso. But mostly Diet Dr. Pepper. Yeah.

2. Do you honestly think your trainer is the best trainer for you? Yes. And I care too much about my horse and my riding to have a trainer where the answer to this might be no.

3. One token of advice a fellow rider/trainer/horse person told you that you still remember to this day.
"You wouldn't go to war without a gun" (for that time I showed up without a stick to my first 3"6' jumper class).

4. If riding meant costing your family so much money that they'd basically be on the poverty line, or making your family terribly unhappy, would you still do it? If we're talking my future wife/kids scenario, probably not. But then they'd have to deal with my depressed bitchy ass, so they'd probably tell me to go do it anyway.

5. Would you ride while pregnant? I want to say yes but I think once I got on I would be too scared I'd ruin everything!

6. How do you tell when a horse likes someone/has bonded with you or someone else? When they act differently around that person they've 'bonded' with than anyone else. My old lease horse tolerated me, and I even think she liked me, but she didn't have that je ne sais quoi with me like she did with her 'real' mommy.

MAKE THE BOND

7. Are horses capable of loving, in your opinion? I don't think animals know the L word like humans do, so no, not in the way we've defined it in English language. Yes I'm being a super technical wet blanket and no I don't care.

But I sure do love him.

8. If you could have one horse from your past come back for 5 minutes, who would it be, why, and what would you do with them in those 5 minutes? Five MINUTES?? Five minutes isn't long enough to do anything!!! I guess the one horse I feel like I never got to say goodbye to was this guy Stretch I rode in college. He taught me the definition of 'heart horse'. And in the five minutes I would give him a treat and turn him out in a huge field and watch him run and buck to his heart's content.

This is him, I still think about him all the time.

9. Should a trainer also be a friend, or should it be a student/teacher relationship? I like having a good relationship with my trainer. Usually I feel like its just student/teacher but I think it's shifting more to friends as I get farther away from my junior years. But I agree with Emma on this one, the #1 requirement is trust.

10. One piece of advice/training you were given by a trainer or mentor that you look back on now and view it as incorrect? 
Hm this is a tough one. I've been lucky, and had very excellent trainers. Maybe not a specific piece of advice is incorrect but as I've grown up my perception of what it takes to be Really Good has changed. It's not about spending six figures on a horse or even your own natural talent. At the end of the day it's the amount of work you're determined to put in. And your willingness to be a student of the sport, forever.