Horsekeeping (22 page)

But Jane was truly frightened of Cody.
Is she a girl who doesn't get it
? I bided my time and wondered. Several weeks later, and after we all got to know Bandi better, I retested both kids.

“Elliot, would you like to have a lesson on Bandi?”

“Sure, when?”

“How about tomorrow? After mine?”

“Okay.”

“Jane, would you like to have a ride on Bandi?” I casually added.

“Yes.”

The next day set a perfect stage: a bossy blue August sky lending a purplish green clarity to the hills that can make a person weep. The Taconic range of mountains hazed away from Riga Meadow's flat pastures, while the gray barns, nearer, sizzled in the heat. Grazing horses half-heartedly swished their tails against slow flies, both creatures spoiled and lethargic with late summer warmth and abundant food. I tacked up Bandi, expecting to show Elliot and Jane what I had learned, but after feeding Bandi some carrots, their waning attention scooted them off to investigate neighboring stalls and otherwise horse around.

I led Bandi from the dim closet of the stable to the sun-drenched path toward the outdoor ring. With Bobbi waiting, I got right to it, wanting to warm up and settle Bandi before the kids grew impatient. I had hoped they'd show some interest in seeing their mother ride, but appropriately self-centered, they used the time to fight with one another and make mischief on the fences, eventually requiring my sharp rebuke from my mount. Elliot slunk off to a hay bale to read his book, while Jane remained to keep up a steady patter.

“Mama, is it my turn yet?”

“Not yet, Janie. Soon.”

Ten seconds later, “Is it my turn now?”

“
Not yet
, Jane. Try to be patient.”

Twenty seconds later, “When is it going to be my turn?”

She climbed on the fence again, opening and closing the gate. With each bang Bandi's ears twitched and his head jerked around.

After my distracted thirty minutes, I spied my good-natured son still absorbed in his book, and flipped Jane to number one for take-off. Up she went, tentative, but game. We wrapped the leathers short enough for Jane's feet to reach the stirrups with her squealing whenever Bandi shifted his weight. Bobbi placed Jane's fingers properly around the reins.

“Sit up straight now, Janie, like a soldier.”

“Like this?” Jane joked, going stiff as a board.

“Exactly. Now we're going to walk around.”

Bobbi maintained a loose grip on the lead line as they giggled and chatted. Bandi acted the protector, and Jane was rigid, not with fear, but delight. After a few rounds, Bobbi gingerly hoisted herself onto the saddle behind Jane, and they rode around together.

“Do you want to trot, Jane?” Bobbi asked.

“Yes.”

“Okay, here we go.”

Bobbi eased into a slow trot, and Jane did her best to stay on her seat. She cracked herself up by dramatically emphasizing the reverberations in her voice as she bounced along to Bandi's swaying butt. They transitioned between walk and trot a few times before Bobbi halted.

“Whoa, Bandi,” Bobbi commanded.

“Whoa, Bandi,” Jane imitated.

“Do you like it, Jane?” I asked.

“Oh, yes. Let's keep going.”

“Well, it's Elliot's turn now.”

“I want another turn.”

Bobbi completed another small circle.

“It's time to get down now, so Elliot can have a turn.”

“NO!”

I had never seen her so adamant. By the time I pried her from the saddle she had dissolved herself in anger, bordering on a tantrum, a weapon she'd only ever engaged twice before. Embarrassed in front of Bobbi who doesn't have kids, I feared she would judge mine spoiled, ill-behaved brats. I wanted her to like them: soon she'd be teaching all of us.

“Oh-oh,” Bobbi said. “That's what happened the first time I got off a horse and look what happened to me.”

We laughed, and Jane pulled herself together. Elliot rode serenely, and Bandi behaved beautifully. Three of us were on board. We would have to see about Scott.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

The Bandi Diaries

B
ARN LIFE WAS TRANSFORMING ME. I had fallen hard that first horsey summer into a polarized relationship: I loved my horse, hated my riding. With so much to learn, I was both daunted and intoxicated by a challenge antithetical to my daily life as mother and spouse. Horsekeeping and riding is intellectual, emotional and physical, requiring extreme concentration, calm wits and no small dose of bravery. Between Mommy brain and genetics, I lacked all three.

My immediate challenge was steering. I was warned that tugging on the reins, my first inclination, should be my last resort. Ideally, the lower legs and ultimately the “seat” (this complex misnomer includes the abdomen, lower back, pelvis, glutei and thighs; in short, everything from the lowest rib to the knee), are all; experienced horses sense direction requests by subtle weight shifts emanating from my eyes and head through to my butt in the saddle. This “connection” was that simple and yet frustratingly elusive. When I trotted toward a turn Bobbi would repeatedly mantra:

“Look where you want to go, about three paces ahead. Use your right lower leg to tell him to turn left, and position your left leg as a post around which you want his body to bend. Loosen your thighs.”

My legs felt tragically connected to my upper body: right and left refused to operate independently and when I engaged them my arms pulled on the reins. Afraid of losing my balance I gripped my thighs to steady myself and Bandi stopped, as I had just issued the “halt” command.
Why is this so complicated? Can't I just tug on the left rein to go left?
I trotted on again, and Bandi cut the corner courtesy of my weak inside lower leg. My “posting” strung along like a wet noodle, and my strenuous leg commands didn't faze Bandi, so, compensating, I brought up both my hands and crossed them to the right of Bandi's maned neck, an intuitive but misguided attempt to drag him out to the rail.

“Keep your hands low, just above and at either side of his neck at the withers.
Where are the withers, again?
Pull back just slightly on the inside rein to turn his head in the direction you want to go, and keep your inside left leg on to keep him from cutting the corner.”
This is Twister on a conveyor belt.

I reengaged my legs to little effect as Bandi cut the next corners even shallower. Sweat was dripping into my eyes. Like most people, the inside muscles of my legs from groin to ankle are weak, having rarely been called into such strenuous service. These and the boney part of my pelvis killed for two days each time I rode until I “earned” my seat. And I'm not talking minimal discomfort, more the realm of moan out loud pain that starts off with a bang the next morning and builds to cataclysm the day after that. No matter that I had practiced Iyengar style yoga for five years, a branch that emphasizes correct postures, held long and with precision. Going into this horse thing, I expected the burn of saddle rubs, but smugly reckoned I would escape the deep muscle aches. I figured yoga found and toned every muscle in my body. And it did, except for my inner thighs. My teacher, Michael, confided that he personally never experienced soreness anything like he did after riding. And he can practice yoga for six hours a day. Certifiably, riding engages these muscles like no other “exercise.”

In desperation I purchased “comfy rumps.” This white polyester girdle-type underpant with a yellow foam cushion built into the crotch
resembles something my grandma used to wear, but held promise against pelvic bruises and rub burns. I tried not to glimpse myself in the mirror or let Scott catch me in these beauties (decidedly
un
sexy underwear would be heavy ammunition against riding in his book), and I surreptitiously perspired in them through several lessons. But there was no remedy except more time in the saddle. For several weeks after Bandi's arrival my cowboy stance elicited snickers from my family, particularly my groaning wobble upon rising from a short sit-down or a full night's sleep. Scott laughed a little less when he realized what it meant for our sex life. But the pain slowly dissipated and didn't return even after I returned to New York City and could manage only one ride a week instead of four or five.

While my seat conditioned, my steering hardly improved, becoming a joke around the Riga Meadow barn. One day Bobbi and I worked in the smaller dressage ring, an area “fenced in” by calf-height portable plastic barriers arranged as a large rectangle. Still nervous at the speed of the canter, I was working hard just to stay on. There is generally an end of a ring that horses take exception to. In the same manner that they meander as slow pokes leaving the barn and thunder like Thoroughbreds heading back, it is usually the far side of the ring they cut, and cozy up to the near end. Home exerts a gravitational pull on these creatures, and even if they are well-trained to legs, hands, seats and eyeballs, it's in there.

“Okay. As you're coming into this turn, you already know he is stiffer and less willing this leftward direction. Look ahead to where you want to go. He'll feel your head turn and your body shift. Use a little right leg to tell him turn left, and keep your left leg on to push him out to the rail and bend him around. If you have to, give a little squeeze with your left rein to turn his head in the direction you want to turn, but not too much or he'll think you want to slow down to a trot.”

Okay
, I briefed myself,
I know what to do. It all makes perfect sense. Right leg turns, left leg pushes and bends his middle out. Don't pull up my hands. Look where I want to go
.
Breathe.

We aimed to turn. I looked left toward eleven o'clock. Bandi looked right at the barn at two o'clock. I looked right to see what he was looking at. It was hard to squeeze and work my legs independently, especially just a fast squeeze with the lower right, but a firm pressure with the lower left, keeping my thighs loose.
How can I be so spastic?
Bandi cantered toward the corner with no bend in him. I tried to squeeze my legs a little harder but discovered that my sloppy general squeeze just meant “go” more. I tried to figure out what he was looking at stage right. He headed more right than left and picked up speed.
Uh-oh.

“Look where you want to goooo . . . ,” Bobbi yelled, her voice receding into the distance.

But I was fixated on where Bandi wanted to go, back to the barn. A zombie, my panic led to inaction. Next thing I knew we had stormed the six-inch barricade out of the ring. Instinct pulled my arms up sharply on the reins and, miraculously, he turned around and stopped.
Whew:
a
t least my arms work when they need to
. Panting, I remembered the scene in
Seabiscuit
when a horse bolted for his stall and rammed his jockey into the side of the barn, maiming him for life. I was a little squeamish about that.

“Well, that's a first,” chuckled Linda, teaching in another ring. She shook her pig-tailed head.

“Those were some superb jumping skills,” Bobbi joked, walking over to retrieve us. “Why don't we try that corner again?”

During my walk of shame back to my loser's circle of a dressage ring I soothed my dignity with inverted pride at having accomplished something that could still amuse such veterans. I was the day's class clown but there was a silver lining: Bandi took that “leap” as smooth as could be, indicating that jumping him might be easier than trotting and steering him.

After several weeks attending to my turning and cantering, Bobbi tested me out in the grass where rails did not keep us both honest. The open field loomed vast and hazard-filled, but I trusted Bobbi, and knew that when I stopped anticipating and simply did, like a robot, what she told me, it worked. We mapped out our imaginary ring in which I
trotted and cantered, sometimes steering, sometimes not. Once or twice I really got in a pickle, with Bandi totally ignoring my commands, turning left toward the barn even though I was clearly commanding, vociferously with legs and eyeballs pumping, or so I thought, right.