Anniversaries. And looking ahead.

I rode Snips again yesterday.  On the way there bought more sugar cubes, and put a decent sized handful into my pocket. Seeing Snips was really lovely.   He wants to throw his head up when being bridled, but I was gentle and after only one head toss he stood quietly while I slipped it over his ears and told him gently he was a goose.  He's still barging along a bit, and hanging onto that left rein, but by the end of my lesson with Kyrstal, while Grant recuperates from his operation, we were working better together.  After the lesson I sat on Snips while Krystal talked to me about the horse and his idiosyncrasies, I would lean forward, and he turned his head back to me, so I could give him a sugar cube.  Alright, it might have been 3 or 4 in the end.  When I took him back to his box, and unsaddled him and rugged him up he leant his face into my hands, and I breathed him in, and that's done me a lot of good. 

Last Thursday was the 8th August 2013.  It was a tough day 10 years ago.  Ten (10) years ago, on 8 August 2003, my 18 month old son Heath was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes.  My mum had been with me the day he was admitted.  And Fenella came  to my aid as well, and stayed the night in hospital with me, and Heath's Dad drove all night from Cobar to return home the next morning.  I couldn't put Heath down, he was so sick, and he clung to my chest with all his drips and leads.  Mum stayed with me all day, then without warning Fenella walked through the door of the ICU, and she stayed the entire night with me.  When I was almost out of my head with exhaustion, she picked him up and held him for 2 hours to let me sleep, and he just clung to her. 

I dug up these images I took a few days after we were admitted, when Heath was well enough to be moved into the general pediatrics ward after being in the Intensive Care Unit for 2-3 days. 

Mochy, Heath's special bear (he still has him) is in the centre.  Rufus, The Bear With Diabetes is on the right.  He's the bear the Diabetic Educator handed to me when she walked in to me and Heath in the Emergency Unit as they tried to find a vein to rehydrate him, and I stared at her with unseeing eyes.  Ainsley is on the right.  Hospital cots are cold. And clinical.
Heath.  Aged 18 Months.  Type 1 Diabetic.  With his bear troop.
Night time in hospital.  10 Years ago.  My Dad phoned me the evening Heath was admitted, with urgency in his voice, saying that really firm decisions needed to be made about the future.  I'm at that stage again.
The showjumping and Pony Club shoots went well and I'm working on another project with a good client and so that's exciting.  Bungendore is a fantastic little Pony Club, and the day reinforced our desire to live in a region that has a strong horse focus.  There were some lovely horses, and ponies that made Jessica renew her begging for a horse.  Who can blame her for this?  Evan came and picked up Heath and Jessica about half way through the day and they went back to their house.  Anya, Fenella and myself joined them after Pony Club finished.  We stayed for dinner and Evan cooked the tastiest pork belly I've ever tasted.

Yesterday we also came dangerously close to a very costly mishap on our way to school yesterday morning on our way to school. I snibbed the door, asked Heath to pull it closed, and got into the car.  Heath didn't listen and he didn't do it.  I arrived home 2 hours later to find the door wide open.  My head spun as I walked through the door.  I guess that one little mistake could have turned this into The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Month....  We were very lucky.








 
 



Now this WAS a super looking and moving mare..  Temperamental..  But imagine being bought a horse like this..  At whatever age...





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Legacy of Eight Carat: From the Vault Volume I

Image
We have been back in lockdown here in Victoria. Lockdown 5.0 to be precise and as a result it made us go back to feeling like sad sacks.  After having seen off Lockdown 4.0 a teeny tiny bit triumphantly, where we saw off both Delta and Kappa variants (evil beasts that they are - curse you stinky COVID - curse you), we had literally only just gotten back to work before being very suddenly plunged back into Lockdown 5.0 after the visit of those very nice removalists.   'Thanks very much!!!!' we all shouted indignantly!!!!  A key difference with Lockdown 5.0 was that half the country also into lockdown at the same time which made us feel slightly less sad.  The Victorian Government doesn't muck about anymore when it comes to outbreaks.  Their reaction is swift and severe and not at all namby pamby.  I just wish the same logic would be applied to Sydney which continues to deteriorate, much to my dismay.  This week we took our first tentative steps out of ...
Read more

Vale Sadler's Wells - champion stallion dies in Ireland.

Image
One of the most important racehorses, and later stallions of our time, the great Sadler's Wells died in Ireland on the evening of Tuesday 26 April 2011.  He died at Coolmore's Tipperary Stud in Ireland, his home since his retirement in 1984.  The stallion was retired from breeding in 2008. His legacy worldwide is immense.  He has left sons and daughters,  and three of his stallion sons, in Galileo, Montjeu and High Chaparral, are leading stallions in the Northern Hemisphere.  In Australia, Galileo and Montjeu had less success, however the impact of High Chaparral was immediate, and immense.  While the horse still has to repeat the success he achieved with his New Zealand bred runners, from which the Group 1 winners, and champion So You Think, were conceived, High Chaparral is still leading the Australian General Sires Title with only a couple of months of racing left. In Europe, Montjeu and Galileo have both sired Epsom Derby winners, in Authorized and Ne...
Read more

The physical drain of riding horses

Image
Most people agree that the life of a jockey is a difficult one.  There are a handful that rise to the top, and do extremely well out of the Sport of Kings.  The vast majority however struggle with their weights, and do their best to avoid and/or overcome injury.  Anyone who has ever been pelted off a horse would know that it doesn't tickle!  And of course the older you get, the more it hurts!  We used to fang around on our ponies, bareback, in headstalls and leadropes, never wearing a riding hat.  Completely fearless, and I am sure that on the odd occasion I parted company with my horse, I used to bounce.  In fact I rarely used to fall off, unless the horse came down as well, I guess all those years of galloping around bareback meant my balance and ability to swing my body with the horse was pretty good.  I'd like to say that I could still ride the same, but age and the maturing mind catches up, and you start thinking of the consequences of 'what...
Read more