Failure

I've gone back and forth deciding whether to even blog about our latest experience or not. As hinted by the title, it was not a good one. I feel as though my heart's been broken, my ideas of reality have been stripped, and I'm confused and angry and saddened and happy it wasn't worse (because as horrible as it was, it could have been much, much worse).

First things first, no one was hurt. It is by the grace of God the only injuries sustained Saturday were from my riding boots taking both heels down to raw, bloody skin from hiking in them for 15 miles. Yes, you read correct: 15 miles. Jasper was so much worse than our ride in Eagle in early May, 2009. So very much worse. Although this time I could not blame it on little sleep, the stress of final exams, too much high-octane food and not enough exercise.

I can't say I can pinpoint the exact thing which triggered the whole sequence of events, other than to say Saturday was, I believe, the culmination of all negative aspects of Jasper and my relationship coming to a head. There were also a whole bunch of other things out of my control that only added fuel to the fire and left me with a horse I was not proud to call my own.

I'll start at the beginning-ish. The saddle trial went well, I decided to purchase the Equinox. It fit him well enough and it fit me. I felt secure, balanced, comfortable in the saddle. I found I felt more confident with the improved balance, and so that part was an improvement. I trailered both horses up early Friday morning and secured a spot. As usual, Jasper camped like a pro, laying flat-out for parts of the night and tanking up on water like a champ.

Friday I'd started feeling a little under the weather--telltale scratchy throat and plugged sinuses that hinted at something a little more than an allergic reaction to the smoke in the air. I'm not sure how this played into things, other than to leave me with a little less in my tank than usual. During the night, I has several extremely vivid dreams that something horrible would happen the next day--lameness, broken bones, tie-up, etc. Premonition? Who knows. I awoke in the morning feeling more nervous than usual and even a little nauseous. The only hint from Jasper that anything was different was his higher than normal RHR at camp--57 bpm as we walked 15 mins late towards the start line. My plan was to ride day 1 alone, just like the old days. I hand-walked him down the road, just as we had done the year before. We were passed by a few riders, but eventually Jasper calmed down enough for me to mount and proceed. Nothing unusual--he was asking to trot before I would let him, and once he was properly warmed up I asked for an easy 8-9 mph trot, which he kindly obliged. For the next 3 miles or so we would trot and walk for small stretches. I took a wrong turn and ended up on the same stretch of trail we ALWAYS make a wrong turn at. This, looking back, may have been the key to ruining our ride. (I find I'm not able to focus as well on trail markings when I'm trying to keep a 15.3 hand horse from galloping for 20 miles.) But, he wasn't spooking, he was focused and positively vibrating beneath me. I still felt as though the slightest thing would lead to an uncontrolled bolt--he was head-tossing in objection whenever I would rate him. Soon, we descended a dirt single-track towards a creek crossing and I heard riders behind. Shit, I thought. Sure enough, they were the front-runner 30's. I asked them to go ahead, and this is about the point where Jasper came completely unglued. I knew we would be passed several times by the faster LD riders and Jasper would continue to deteriorate.

But, I walked on, hoping for a sweet spot I could re-mount and ride through. I attempted several times to get back on, and every single time Jasper would raise his head in the air and prance sideways when I would refuse to let him trot on--he did this several times while ignoring drop offs on the side of the trail. To say I was scared would be an understatement. I think I made it about 1.5 miles past the creek crossing before deciding it was a losing battle and that I needed to turn around and head back. 8 miles into the first loop still made it 8 miles back to camp and 13 miles to finish the loop. So I turned around and walked back. And I managed to keep it together until I saw Wayne trotting towards me on his little black mare.

We continued on, I attempted to ride only once--it started out well enough and quickly deteriorated into a fight with Jasper once again giving no regard to cliffs and trail edges. I had to dismount rather abruptly in order to be free of the horse who was giving every possible sign he was going to bolt. I'm not going to pepper this with lies about how I remained calm and collected the entire time--more than once I lost my temper, lost control of my emotions, and Jasper ended up with the brunt of it. I'm not proud of how I handled things, and something about hiking 15 shuffling miles with blisters has a way of putting things into perspective for a person. I tried to remember I was emotional and that I shouldn't make any decisions until I'd slept on it, but I was strongly leaning towards selling Jasper, selling Onyx, and being rid of horses altogether. At one point, I tried to think of something about the situation that was funny, as laughing has a way of making me feel better about life. I literally couldn't think of one thing that was funny, which made me cry all the harder.

I finally made it back to camp, handed in my card, and headed directly to the trailer. My GPS read 18.34 miles in 6 hours and 13 mins, and I know I rode only about 3 of those miles. I untacked Jasper, made sure he had food and water, and packed my suitcase into the car Wayne had driven up on Friday night and left with the dogs. I wanted to put as much distance between myself and Jasper as possible and I couldn't stand to have another person ask how I was doing or to ask if I was ok. I didn't want to talk about it, I didn't want to talk about decisions I had to made, I didn't want to talk about how I could fix it, I didn't want to hear any "you should have" or "you could have" or anything. I didn't want to hear I there was nothing I could have done and everything would be OK because I knew I had failed. I failed Jasper as a rider, as a leader, as a caretaker, and as a friend.

Which brings me to now. I'm not going to throw this away based on one ride, even if this has been a few rocky months leading to this ride. The fact of the matter is, if Jasper (and endurance) and I were a married couple, we would be at a point in our relationship where divorce is inevitable without professional assistance. We may come out of this stronger than ever, but we may not come out at all. Walking gave me time to think about our relationship and how things that have changed. Heading into last season, I spent a whole lot more time just puttering with Jasper. He learned to trust me over the challenging terrain of Moscow Mountain, he learned to trust me in new situations. All in all, he learned that by putting his trust with me, I was not going to do anything that hurt him. Our relationship was strong and we worked as a team. We did new things together and swinging a saddle onto his back did not mean a conditioning ride. This season, I have taken it for granted that he's conditioned and doesn't need as much riding. I ride once or twice a week, and the rides are purely conditioning. Sure, I've gotten on him a couple times in the arena but only to attempt to tweak things I feel need improvement on the trail. And those sessions usually fall apart when he is resistant and I'm frustrated and bored.

Here's the bottom line and the essence of my plan for the next several months: I want to do endurance with Jasper. If Jasper can't do endurance, I won't do endurance with him.

My relationship with him needs to be stripped down to the barest foundation. I will have a chiropractor come out and look at him. I will have his teeth checked (wait, I'm a vet. I'll check his teeth) and floated if necessary. I will eliminate pain as a possible cause. Then we will move on. I will begin taking dressage lessons weekly. I will work with him more on new activities that don't focus on conditioning. I will do groundwork with him and re-establish myself as trusted leader. I will read Sally Swift and Jane Savoie and Linda Tellington and Clinton Anderson. I will give everything I've got to rebuilding our relationship from the ground up, and if at the end, Jasper doesn't want to do endurance, we will do something else--together.