Butt Imprints

The weather lately has been a joke. It has either rain or snowed every week since probably September. While I’m all about getting enough rain to keep things alive there comes a point where you’ve gotten to much- we’ve passed that point and nothing ever seems to dry. But we did have a few glorious warm days that helped the ground dry out a little bit! This also meant that I got to RIDE MY DAMN HORSE!!!!!

Marley decided she wanted to wear mud colored eyeshadow. Yay for grey mares...

Oh man it was a glorious feeling!!! I hoped on him Monday afternoon after work and it was like coming home. My butt imprints from riding countless hours in my saddle over the past 5ish years welcomed me back like an old friend. My muscle memory just relaxed into it and I felt at peace. For about 2 seconds that is!

Missed these ears!!!

I didn’t ride for long because the sun was starting to set but I rode long enough to think “oh shit, I’m so damn unfit” Chimi felt good though. His nasty habit of curling was back in full force so I had to remind him to stick his nose out but other than that it was a really nice first ride back!

Somehow the warm 60* weather continued on into Tues and I thought YES! I will ride 2 days in a row!!!! What what?!?!? As soon as I got on though my body protested! Gone was that warm hug from my butt imprints and instead there were all the pressure points screaming at me. Ouch! My legs hurt from the stirrups leathers! Ouch my inner thighs hurt! Uggggh!!! Why does everything hurt?!?!

did lunge him for a few minutes to make sure his back was warmed up enough before climbing on. He was perfect though 

I ignored the sore spots and headed to my little ring. After walking around and loosening up my muscles I asked for the trot and proceeded to flop onto poor Chimi’s back like a sack of potatoes! Wtf legs?!? Why won’t you work?!? So I quickly pushed through it and got my balance back but it was a struggle. My legs tired quickly so it was a short ride (plus the sun was setting yet again… looking forward to the days getting longer!)

Sun setting and the security light comes on...it's close enough to the area I can sort of call it  an arena light? But just barely... only shines in about a 20meter circle so only kinda helpful in the winter months

My good luck continued on into Wednesday and even though it was a little bit cooler it was still warm enough to enjoy a quick ride! I hoped on again and thankfully the sore spots were kinda dulled and it felt like a normal day getting back into the saddle. We headed down to the ring and after warming up I started to trot and about 2 seconds later I thought “holy crap- I feel like a rank beginner!” My balance was off, my muscles sore, and I couldn’t make my body do what I wanted to to help Chimi out. He motored on around the ring like a good boy but I didn’t have the coordination to really do more than let him poke around as I fought to stay with his big bouncy trot. I even tried to slow him down and he was like “walk? Ok… oh slow trot… ummm, no” I gave up on that quickly bc his big trot was really nice and forward but I knew he wasn’t using his butt to push off the ground. I figured I’d let him motor around bc it was still a controlled trot and I’d work on the push after I got my riding legs back!

Sunsets from the ring

I started to quickly fade and then thought about KC and Pilgrim’s trot sets to getting him legged back up for his suspensory. While Chimi is fine, I am not so I figured that those trot sets would be a good way for me to get started! I set the timer on my phone to 2 minutes and off we went! It was terrible. Tracking to the right I thought the 2 minutes would never end. My poor wonderful horse was such a trooper and just marched along while I got my body back in place. When the 2 minutes were up we walked for 4 minutes and then changed directions. Going to the left wasn’t to bad and I found myself stopping at the beep instead of thinking “when will this end!”

Chimi wondering when I'll stop taking pictures and bring him inside so he can eat

So basically I am going to trot set myself back into riding fitness. That and join a gym. Living in the middle of nowhere has it's perks but also it's drawbacks. Gyms aren't exactly on every block and even then they're kinda small and expensive for what you get. But for right now a gym is better than no gym especially because the weather has yet again turned south and it rained all day Thurs and is supposed to rain on and off today. We've gotten so much rain already that my phone keeps reminding me to watch for areal flooding. My arena is back under water after spending a week covered in a foot of snow. Oh well!!!! Chimi doesn't mind an extended vacation after his 3 days of work!