all those girls in love with horses
In case you don't follow the sport of kings - Barbaro, the horse who won the KY Derby, broke his leg in 3 places in the Preakness. He's had surgery and is so far okay. But that's it for showtime.
I love horses, but I don't think I'll own one for quite awhile. It's too much of a commitment. I'm leasing Bear now, but people at my barn are always telling me about horses for sale, even free horses. There are plenty of those around, precisely because people can't afford to take care of them as they'd like.
And because there are so many sound yet cheap/free horses, some owners have a pretty low budget for vet bills. Horses are prone to foot problems, and some owners will put a horse down if a simple antibiotic doesn't knock an infection out. It's expensive to treat horses, plus a foot problem could ruin a whole summer's riding, so I can't say I blame them. But I couldn't do it.
Horses are kinda mysterious, full of contradictions, and we girls have a unique connection with them. They're big but super-sensitive. They're sweet and playful, but they have this innate sense of how to take care of riders, too. Because they're so sensitive, they don't trust as easily as, say, dogs - but once you've won their trust, you're in. It's such great feeling walking out to the barn, whistling for your horse, and seeing them run, whinny, and toss their head. See Robert Vavra's All Those Girls in Love With Horses if you want to get into the history of it.
I like this bit from today's NY Times about Barbaro:
"In victory and defeat, and every day in between, horses remain wordless creatures. To those in the sport who spend their days caring for them, these thousand-pound thoroughbreds are like children — not in any sentimental sense, but in the sense that they cannot take care of themselves. They need people to provide them with water, food, shelter, exercise. The good ones are treated the way every child should be treated — with the mixture of care and discipline best suited for that particular individual."
There are also plenty of horse owners who never ride. They just feed, groom, and hang out with their horses. My favorite owner at my barn is one of these - her stalls are spick-and-span, her horse looks perpetually ready for a show, and she never rides. But she's out there with him more than any other owner there, usually grooming him, or just sitting there on a lawn chair next to his stall.
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