First horse stories are a beginning.  A beginning of a lifelong love affair.  That first horse holds a place in our heart and soul that lays the groundwork for all the horses that come next.  Our passion leads us to the horse and the horse leads us to a new dimension of learning, experiencing and relating.  Here is a first horse story from Dianne McCleery that is both heartwarming and heartbreaking.  Enter the experience of her first love affair.

Rippling Wave

I was a horse-crazy little girl, wanting nothing more than to have my own horse. My father was a career military officer. We moved often, leaving behind friends and beloved pets. Money was tight, and no way was there time or money for me to obtain my dream.
Over the years I took lessons and on occasion had ridden friends’ horses. And never did the dream of having my own horse die.
Then, when I was sixteen, a school mate who knew I loved horses asked if I wanted one. Her sister was off at college and had no time to ride hers. After the farrier would shoe this horse, he would come up lame for several days afterwards. She didn’t feel right in selling him.
I asked my parents if I could have him, fingers and toes crossed. Luckily, I had a part time job at a ranch, so I could afford the monthly costs for a horse. Wonders of wonders, my parents said yes!
I became the proud owner of Rippling Wave, Rip for short, a half-Morgan, half-Standardbred gelding. I thought he was beautiful and fell in love at first sight. He was a dark chestnut, about fifteen years old, and supposedly well-trained. I moved him to a small boarding facility where he had a stall and attached corral. I had stars in my eyes and floated through the next few days.
When Saturday came, I saddled and bridled Rip and led him through a pasture to the trail behind the property. Taking a deep breath, I mounted up and, for the first time in my life, was riding my own horse.
What I hadn’t counted on, and was too green to notice, was that Rip hadn’t been ridden in a long, long time. He danced under me, swinging his butt this way and that, as I wrestled with the reins to try to get control.
A man on a white horse rode up the trail. At that point, Rip, who had slid down a short bank to under a tree, reared up. A tree branch caught me around the neck, and Rip took off at a gallop. The man’s horse bolted after him. I ended up in the dirt on my butt.
I was crushed. I searched in the dirt for my glasses and luckily found them. My dream come true had turned into a nightmare. My neck hurt, my butt hurt, my soul hurt. The man rode his white horse back up the trail, leading Rip by the reins. He handed them to me, asking, “Are you okay?”
I nodded yes, not trusting myself to speak.
I led Rip back through the pasture, un-tacked him, put him back in his corral, and slunk back home. I felt like I couldn’t tell anyone what had happened. I didn’t want to hear, “I told you so,” or “Be careful what you wish for.” I had already learned to hide from my family what was happening in my life.
I tossed and turned that night, not knowing what to do. I had my horse, and at this point, it was a disaster.
The next day, I returned to Rip. Another boarder was there, and I told her what happened. “Sounds like he was just fresh,” she said. She pointed to a flat area and said, “You can lunge him there.” I asked what lunging meant and she explained. (Lunging is putting a halter on a horse, attaching a long line, then standing in the center moving the horse around you. You are safe on the ground; the horse can get his ya-yas out.) So I haltered Rip, attached a long lead line, and sent him out around me. At first he kicked and bucked, which had me holding on for dear life and learning the meaning of “rope burn.” But soon he settled down, trotting rhythmically in a big circle, head lowered. I went home that night feeling a bit more optimistic.
After several days of lunging where Rip became nothing less than a gentleman, I saddled and bridled him again. I took him out to the trail and wisely hand-walked him down to the community arena. This time when I settled into the saddle, there was no dancing, only a well-trained horse that walked, trotted, and cantered on command. Now I was ecstatic! I was a horse owner, and I was in heaven!
Rip turned out to be the perfect first horse. I spent hours on his back, riding him in the arena, down trails, across meadows, and even once to the beach where we splashed through waves. Interestingly, he never once turned up lame after shoeing.
A couple of months after Rip dumped me on my butt, I came across the man on the white horse again. He looked at me in astonishment. “Is that the same horse?” he asked. I nodded. I was riding Rip bareback, no saddle, in a halter with a looped lead rope for a bridle, no bit. Life was good.
I had a wonderful six months with Rip before we had to move across country once again. My father’s secretary loved horses. She could afford the monthly board, but not the cost of a horse. I gave Rip to her, and he lived pampered for the rest of his life, giving rides to her and her nieces and nephews.
When Rip reared up and caught me by the neck in that tree, that wasn’t the first time I’d come off a horse. Nor was it the last. But it was certainly the most traumatic and taught me to be very, very sure a horse is ready to be ridden before even thinking about putting a foot into a stirrup.
And I bless the kindness of Rip’s original owner who made a horse-crazy girl’s dream come true, my parents for saying “yes” when I asked if I could have him, and the wise woman who taught me how to lunge a horse.
–END–

Dianne Chapman McCleery is a lifelong horsewoman.  Her credits and accomplishments are included but not limited to completion of CSHA”s Horsemanship Course, Barefoot Shoeing instruction and a one time certification in energy healing.  She specializes in Natural Horsemanship and Equine Behavior, having studied under Anne Soule of Foothill Equestrian Center.

 

 

 

The summer I was 52, I spent being 12 again.
It’s sweet when life gives you second chances. And when that chance has to do with horses, well, that’s twice as sweet.
I was a horse-crazy little girl. Unfortunately, I was born into a military family, and numerous moves made riding difficult at times. However, on one of those moves we lived in Fairfax, Virginia. I took lessons at a riding stable deep in Virginia horse country, an hour away from our home, and progressed as steadily as one could while riding one day a week.
Once when I was at those stables, I saw a girl my age, around twelve, cleaning out a stall. She held a pitchfork, and a wheelbarrow was stationed across the stall door. Dickie, my favorite mount, was tied outside. I wanted to be that girl; I wanted to be holding that pitchfork, be a part of that stable, making life pleasant for horses, not just showing up once a week to ride.
Several decades later, I lived on the opposite side of the country in the California Sierra Nevada foothills. One day I signed up my kids to take riding lessons at a local equestrian center. I watched two of those lessons, then approached the owner. “Anne,” I said, “would it be okay, I mean, can I take lessons with my kids?” I tried desperately (and probably unsuccessfully) to keep the pleading tone out of my voice.
The answer was an enthusiastic, “Of course.”
Although I’d had horses several times in my life, I hadn’t owned a horse in over fifteen years. I wasn’t even sure I could get up on one. That worry ended when my mount for my first lesson was Rosie, who was 13.2 hands tall, a pony, very easy to swing up on. Months passed, and the kids and I improved our riding skills, became more educated about horses, and enjoyed being at the stables.
About a year later, a note appeared on the bulletin board – the Saturday stall cleaner needed someone to take over her duties for a couple of months while she recovered from surgery. Hmm, I wondered if I could do that. I could offset some of the money we spent on lessons. And I thought back to that day when I was twelve and longed to be the one cleaning stalls. Did I really want to clean stalls now? At my age?
I read that note for a couple of weeks before I brought the subject up to Anne. “Do you think I could cover stall cleaning duties on Saturdays?” I asked. Again, an enthusiastic, “Of course.”
So here I was, on the plus side of 50, with a job cleaning stalls, shoveling, well, you-know-what. Although there were other adults who did this, I would by far be the oldest. Also, my normal work takes place in front of a computer; I’d never before had a job where I was a laborer. And the pay, although generous by industry standards, was at a rate I’d hadn’t seen in decades. My husband thought I was going off my rocker. Maybe I was.
I showed up the first day in worn jeans, an old t-shirt, and work gloves. I found that shoveling manure and shavings into a cart was not difficult. However, getting it out was.
In the first pen, I loaded the wheelbarrow to the brim with wet shavings and manure. Then I had to muscle the full cart out of the pen, not an easy task. There was a slope up to the top of the manure pile. I got stuck half way up and had to retreat. I made a run at that pile and barely got the cart to the top. Then I tried to upend it to dump it; it wouldn’t budge. I had to turn around, squat, grab the lower edge of the cart, and, straining away, shove upwards with my legs. The cart tipped over, and finally it was empty. One stall down. After that, I learned to take half-loads.
Although I never learned to love cleaning stalls, there were parts of my job that were pure joy: hearing horses nicker in the cool of the morning when I showed up to feed, visiting with others who loved horses, learning how to wrap legs and evaluate horses’ health and wellness. And it was definitely a physical job; some days I was so tired by the end of my chores, I could barely hold it together to drive home.
But, I was spending full days at the barn, which I would have loved to have done when I was twelve and was pretty darn great at 52. I could visit with others who loved horses; I built new muscles; I watched Anne work magic with green horses; I would listen as Anne taught others, something I found particularly valuable for my own riding for the repetition of the basics. The payback for cleaning stalls was all I’d hoped for.
I can’t say I was sorry when the regular stall cleaner came back to work since my back was beginning to complain. But I felt I was able to have an experience that I had desperately wanted when I was twelve. What a sweet second chance!

Dianne Chapman McCleery lives in the Sierra Nevada Foothills. She loves all things horses and particularly enjoys learning body work techniques to help improve horses’ lives.

Long before I was a teacher I was a student. From the first breath shared with a horse, I was enraptured. It became my mission, in whatever level of maturity I lived, to learn all my limited mind and bottomless heart could encompass about the horse. My early teachers, guides and horse friends were books. Margaret Henry, Walter Farley, C.W. Anderson, Margaret Cabell Self, Mary O’Hara, Will James, Dan Muller; famous and obscure, factual and fictional, I read everything related to horse.
My first riding teachers included Del Gonzales, Andy Ruiz, Dr. McCormick and Western Horseman.

Obie (short for Obnoxious) was a donkey, my first equine.  He gave me his full friendship.  I was young ( 11 years old) and inexperienced enough to laugh when Obie chased my little brother out of his personal space.  We wandered the dirt roads around our home, jumping little branches in the road.  He was everything I needed and wanted.  I could easily hop onto his back.  I think that is what gave me the confidence to vault onto a horse and ride a bare back.  Our honeymoon was short lived.  The family returned one night, actually one early morning, to Obie’s bellowing welcome.  I think my parents envisioned lights coming on in every house bordering our short dirt road.  They rehomed him within week.

My greatest teacher was Champagne Lady. She taught me to be light, sensitive and honest. To this day I am in awe of the quality of horse who was my first. Her training was far beyond my experience, but she taught me with the help of human guides. She was my ground and the expression of my spirit from age 14 through 18.  I did not own a saddle until I was twenty-five years old.  Everywhere we went we were bareback.  We galloped along the surf of Topanga Beach, traversed the PCH to George’s Market, tracked Topanga Creek and even once ventured up Topanga Cyn Blvd. to The Center, my friend riding her horse and my brother riding double with me.  My friend now says “What were we thinking?”  Right?  Sometimes you just have to find out it’s not the smart thing to do by doing it.  I wish I had photos of those years.

For five years I was side tracked by motherhood and marriage. When I came back to horses it was as a teacher as well as a student.  Many years, many changes, and I am still learning.  I learn from friends with whom I share the horse experience, I learn from former students, I learn from other’s exploration into the horse/human relationship, but mostly I learn from the horses.

What are your stories of your first explorations into the horse/human relationship?

 

First it is an imperceptible movement within the vast infinite sea.  Then it is a thought, then it is desire which becomes a passion, an irresistible urge rising out of the depths of all possibilities, a place beyond the limits of imagination.  It pushes and heaves and in a mighty burst birth breaks through the crust of manifestation.

Horse-Rider dripping foam and froth of birth, rises from weightless space of thought into weighted gravity of matter.

Atmosphere presses against body.  Organ crushing unrelenting clamp causes a compulsive whole being inhalation – the in breath of incarnation – now a created concrete beingness, Horse-Rider emerge as one from the sea, riding the momentum of immensity from which it emerges, not yet fully formed, not yet landed.  The heave and roll and undulating current of sea moves it steadily toward shore.   With the force of a cosmic fist driving knuckles first into the wavering seam of creation, Horse-Rider is thrown into manifested life.

Weight, unrelenting weight of matter.  No longer one, but two; Horse and Rider.  Standing in stunned senses, froth of amniotic soup and blood drips and pours from nostrils, ears, eyes, skin, submerging them in a fountain of their own creative fluids.  Another wind blast intake of air fills every internal cave and crevice, lungs and heart open, expand, pulse in separateness, two hearts, two beings.

Horse lowers his head and snorts at the blood spiraling and splashing out from beneath his anxious hooves and shies lifting whole body out of the offensive pool of birth blood.  He turns and inspects, ears forward, nostrils flaring.

Rider grasps tight with hands and legs, nearly unseated in the explosive motion.  Out of balance in this unknown – mind gripping fright, already forgotten the place of beginning.  There is only this heaving creature beneath her.  Vertigo of sensation caught in the curl of a visual, emotional, mental tidal surge, spun in the collapsing tunnel crashing into this new awareness of living.  Senses are stunned by the tsunami impact of sight, sound and feel.  The crash of the curling waves cresting and crumbling against sound blasted rock and sand.  The surge swirls past horse hooves, enervating tickle cold, he backs away, head low, snorting.  Rider grab fistfuls of mane, sensing the shift and alignment of bone, tendons and muscles, unfamiliar inner tension – strength and weakness – looseness and tightness – hard edges and soft curves – an unfolding of opposites within her being, desperately clinging to the back of horse.

Horse snorts at the receding foam, takes a step.  Rider senses movement, feels her body align, another horse step, another adjustment.  The cramping hug of her legs begin to soften, Spine lifts into the vast openness above, aligning her head and neck and shoulders over the bones of her hip.  A sharp and sudden spasm shivers through her, bones lengthen, tendons, ligaments, muscle make connections and wrap joints.

Again she is slammed with outward sensation.  Now sight and sound and touch and smell are differentiated.  The air glistens with micro-mini sun caught molecules.  The rumble of the ocean reverberates through horse’s hooves, penetrating her inner cells, activating the pulse of heart and blood.  Her lungs open, filling with iridescent life breath.  The eye shielding brilliance of the sun disc caresses her outer sense with penetrating heat, skin penetrating, scalp penetrating the heat descends in a golden ray permeating Riders inner being, descending, ascending like a helix through her center, descending through horse, through glimmering sand, to earth’s core.  Spirit of light is embraced in earth womb, kissed in earth consciousness, mother blessing her child through spirit and sending back to Rider, spirit baptized in matter.

Horse explodes in sense overload, legs bend then stiffen shooting him into the air, seeking escape, feeling there is no safety in Rider, her knowing disconnected from their one spirit.  Gravity ensnares him, dragging him to the ground.  He lunges forward, hooves pounding against the sand, propelling him forward with legs frantically pumping beneath his great heart, driving spirit into muscle, extending neck and shoulders, he begins a race for his very life, his spirit, his being.

Rider, thrown off balance, grips horse with grappling arms, legs, hands and feet.  Mind locks in fear, breath shallow, nerves chaotic, shutting out all senses except survival, she hangs in limbo, a broken connection.

Imperceptibly Rider feels a magnetic pull, an attraction, a blossoming of emanating energy from Horse heart, encircling her heart, entraining the turbulent boom of primal pounding, heart to heart.  A tenuous internal connection – she begins to feel the bounding rhythm in Horse’s body.  Through tendrils of fear her mind opens to this connection.  Cautiously she maneuvers her body back onto Horse – recognizing the heave and sway so reminiscent of the sea carrying her and Horse in the currents of the amniotic fluid of creation.  Newly invigorated muscles bunch and lengthen, she leans into the velocity of horse’s headlong charge through his fear, his terror of the grappling, clinging body, unbalanced, unsupported relationship.

Hair ringed hooves harpoon the sand, surf, seaweed, all unheeded in Horse’s unleashed run for survival.   The seaweed wraps and clings to his pasterns and fetlocks, begins to drag and tangle itself as his hooves whip through the stems, stems snaking rope knots about his legs. Trapped, he stops, white foam lathering shoulders and flanks, lungs and heart battering breath and blood.  Every cell in his body trembles.  He feels Rider slip from his back.  Caressing hands console his body, kind crooning sounds soothe his terrified mind.  He feels the knots loosen from his ankles and the rope stems slip from his legs.  Dropping his great head to the ground he takes a deep groaning breath, allowing the comfort of Rider’s hands and voice to assure him that she remembers who they are, that they are still one even though two.

Two yet one, Rider’s heart fills with a hope, an anticipation, a love so big it plunges from the confines of her chest spilling into her arms and legs, feet and hands, shoulders and throat, tumbling into her head, her thoughts, her perception, over flowing and encompassing Horse, so protective of his delicate nervous system, his brave generosity, his need to be one of two.  Love lifted she leaps onto Horse’s broad back, her legs explore the spring of his ribs, the muscles of his back beneath her buttocks, and the damp heat of his sweated hide sticky against her skin.  With breath, intent and a quiet tightening of her legs she urges horse to move forward, stepping out of entanglement, stepping out toward the horizon of fanning, slanting pink, orange and purple pluming as Sun settles into a cosmic nest of radiating color.

White caps play against the sheet of deepening color reflecting orange, yellow, red, blue, indigo, violet – rainbow hued arching to the gusting breeze, tickling ocean skin, exiting nerves of riders skin, infusing her breath with the colors of the sinking sun.  Colors radiate upon the sand heaped dunes and flowering iceplant.  Birds bank in the thrust of the wind, kaleidoscopic colors shining off iridescent wings, shimmering in the brined air, caught in the scalloped sand of the fore beach – scattered sparkling particles of light in air and water and energy.  Rider releases her body to Horse.  Horse offers his mind to Rider.

Rider turns West toward the setting sun, horse moving with her gaze, a compass arrow aligned in shared direction.  Golden light gleams, horizontal light of the setting sun encompass Horse and Rider in a golden shower.  Rider turns South, Horse pivoting to her intention, facing out toward the horizon of the great heaving sea, darkening in the early twilight.  Rider turns North, with horse facing the rounded breast of dunes, casting shadows in the fading light.  Together Horse and Rider turn East, the dunes recede into fathomless distance. Moon, at the border of land and sea is beginning Her lift from the horizon, a breath catching silver radiance seeping into the gloom.  Silhouetted in the cross point of Earth and Sky, Water and Land, Horse and Rider breathe in promise, the promise of adventure, the adventure of love and loss, birth and death, the ageless adventure of embodied spirit.

Horse, restless in anticipation, prances his intention.  Rider soothes, yes, just a moment more.  The sun has set, there is a phosphorescent diamond dust sparkling in the surf, in the surge, in the waves.  Deep shadows drape the dunes, the cuff of coastline arcs against the rising globe of the moon, ending in a rocky point pushing into the pound of the sea.  A symphony of stars grace the domed darkness of sky, vanishing into the depth of sightless horizon.  Horse trembles and snorts, paws and lifts his head, eye open to expansive energy inviting him to engage in its expression.  With an exhale of breath Rider releases Horse.  He springs into the air, bouncing forward on hind legs, forelegs grasping for the promise pulsing in his veins.  His hooves hit the ground running.

And then there is only Horse and Rider and the ecstasy of unrestrained, unfettered freedom, exposed power of energy in motion.  With lengthening stride horse reaches into each moment, driving into the barrier of future, releasing the past footfall, balancing for the next, reach, rebalance, release.  Rider leans into the acceleration of Horse’s charge through space and time, arms outstretched like wings, laughing into the lunar light, hips and legs holding to horse, to the undulating surge so like the great power of the sea.  Together, in the full exaltation of life shared, they race the phosphorescent waves, sparks springing from beneath horse’s flying hooves, sparklers mirroring the moon gleam bouncing across the surface of the throbbing sea.

They gallop, fully extended in physical being, in emotional bliss, in mental unity with each other and all that is within the stage of their theater, breathing great lungful’s of night, laced with starlight, moonbeam and shimmering waves, intoxicated by the wondrous sensations and scents, washed in a wind of their own creation in a tincture of salt and sweat and sea.

As suddenly as their run starts it ends.  Horse crests, mirroring the crown and spray of wave, his hind legs slide underneath him, front legs lifting, back and neck round, the spume of mane and tail flung forward, Horse and Rider reach land’s end.  Rock slick, awash with tidal turmoil, trails into a wash of moonlight, silver mercurial cobblestones form a path across the face of the ocean.

There is but a pause in forward motion, a breath, a half halt.  Rider urges Horse forward into the mystic moonlit moment, each hoof tipping the glistening cobblestones, Horse and rider gallop on, and on, pulled by some great magnet into the cosmic presence of their destiny.  The weight of gravity begins to disintegrate, shedding itself in swaths of iridescent star dust, a shining in the darkness streaking into the bright of the moon.  Rider exhales, her breath twinkling, feeling the spaciousness of body, effortless, wingless flight of Horse as they traverse the outward path, lifted by the primordial dark energy of life and light.

A vibrating orb of green and rose begins to glow within the Heart chakras of Horse and Rider.  Deeper and richer and fuller the colors intensify, expand until one encapsulates the other, blending hearts in unity and energy of love.   Descending matter radiates in a light show of red, orange and yellow, ascending spirit glows in blue, indigo and violet, Horse and Rider, a rainbow comet soaring through the infinite cocoon of space.  An ecstasy of oneness, wholeness even as the weight of embodiment falls in a shower of shooting stars, Horse and Rider release heart and mind to the pull of the great magnet, the path home.

Horse and Rider gallop on and on.  A vibrant glow expands upon the horizon of their path, it fills their vision, a blooming, billowing luminescent cloud, sacred burial place of stars, sacred birthing place to solar systems, enduring stage of reincarnation, the fingerprint of God. Time and space collapse into one infinite moment, one immortal archetype.  Horse and Rider dissolve into particles of gas and dust, a miniscule dot in the sweeping kaleidoscopic dance of color and shape, finding home in nebula, an essence of eons in the exquisite beauty of destruction and creation, forever Horse-Rider in the primordial whole.

Lynnea Honn                                                                                                                                                                         Bunker Hill Rd, Amador City

October 20, 2014

Art by Jan Long Harper