Tickled Pink!

I have a student here who is taking the semester long riding course at Cornell for credit. She has learned a lot there but feels like she needs more riding time to really succeed at that course. She needs help with her balance and coordination at the trot and she's absolutely right - more riding time will get her where she wants to be!

The other day after her lesson she said "Your horses aren't like the horses at Oxley. They go where I tell them to go."

Needless to say, I was tickled pink. For a number of reasons.

1. I grew up at the Oxley Equestrian Center, working as a youth and teenage stable hand, riding their horses, taking their lessons. Amazingly enough, the horse that she rides there is one of the horses I actually learned to canter on. I have a lot of respect for those horses and the workload that they take and the fact that they still behave so well. I also know that they are all worked very regularly to ensure that they keep up to date on their training. 
2. I STILL ride at the Oxley Equestrian Center every Monday night because sometimes, I just need a break from riding here in the cold and need to go to a real jumping facility to hone my skills. I love having a bunch of people there ready and willing to offer advice, consult, and even rip my own riding to shreds because I just can't get that at home. Plus, I have always found the horses there willing and excellent for jumping and most of my horses here are still green at jumping courses.  
3. My horses are good lesson horses, but I always saw them as trail horses first: no spook, no flee, no qualms, sturdy, rugged and willing to do and go anywhere. 

It never occured to me that the work I was doing with them has actually changed them into not only good lesson horses, but phenomenal ones. They all move off of the leg, they can collect or extend when asked, they all can frame up, they can move laterally, they can bend (some better than others), and they can pick up the canter on cue almost every time (most can even pick up the canter on the proper lead in my very small indoor arena). For a group of lesson horses, that either came to me green broke or as true-blue trail horses, I am impressed.

Yes, they don't always act like push-button rides, especially if the rider is sending mixed messages or is off in la-la-landl; but what they do offer is the perfect platform to teach on. For instance:

• If your heels aren't down Maxie most definitely will not trot in the arena. 
• If you are too hard on the reins, Pepsi will start to make her lip-smacking noise. 
• If Scotch even thinks that you're about to fall off she will stop and look at you. 

Add to that the fact that a majority of my lesson horses are mares. That's unheard of, I know. But these girls are so good. They listen so well, and even though they can make some ugly faces once in awhile, they always behave themselves under saddle. 

This whole thought tickles me pink.