Horse husbandry

So what’s it like for you? How does your horse husband/boyfriend/significant other handle your horse habit? Is there anything you do to ensure you can do your thing and keep him happy? What funny habits has he picked up on? What horse skills has he managed to learn? Jackie at regardinghorses.com asked these questions, so here goes:

My husband Ken started the whole thing!

Of course I was a horse lover my whole life. My mom saved one of the first drawings I ever made at about age 3, and it was a horse (with a ballerina dancing on its back; I hadn’t really decided between the two activities back then). But I never had a horse. I know a lot about horses due to my obsessive interest in them and reading about them, but we couldn’t afford to have one despite my constant pleading, and didn’t live anywhere near a riding stable, so lessons were also not an option.

But about three years ago Ken began a constant mulling-it-over kind of monologue. He’d just turned 60, and kept mentioning that since he was a kid he had always wanted a pilot’s license, and had realized it was now or never. One day I was kind of vegging out as he mulled, and I suddenly woke up to the fact that if he for sure was going to fulfill his lifelong dream, so could I.

I actually got started first, just about two years ago, by signing up for riding lessons. Oh my was I flying after that first ride. I did a shaky posting trot with a strap around the horse’s neck to grab onto, and the elation was indescribable. I felt like a helium balloon that had been bumping dully against the ceiling for years, and suddenly was let loose outdoors. I was high.

I think my euphoria was so great it tipped the balance, and Ken finally signed up to learn to fly.

OK, two years later: I have my own incredible horse, Champagne, and Ken has half-ownership of an airplane he calls Tyra, a little one-engine four seater. Since his hobby takes much more money than mine, horse expenses are not an issue. And his hobby also takes him away for hours at a time, so he understands about the time horsing takes.

The latest wrinkle: he is taking riding lessons on Champagne and doing very well. He remembers to look up and out (which I don’t, because I’m always feasting my eyes on the horseflesh). He is getting his balance, and has grown to like Champagne in a fond way, kind of like his fondness for dogs. We hope to go for a week in Wyoming at a dude ranch later this year. And I have been up in Tyra with Ken a few times, and have promised to take enough lessons that I could safely fly and land her if anything should happen to him while he was flying. Am I terrified? Oh my yes.

But when I see Ken all glowing from the inside out in love with his plane and I feel the same way about my horse, I know that despite the costs and the risks for two older people, we’ve got something good going on.