twin recap: rise up

I am just like my country,
young, scrappy, and hungry.
I am not throwing away my shot.

– Right Hand Man; Hamilton

This weekend at Twin was incredible.  Quite literally unbelievable, had I not been there myself.

murray turned fence 1 into an A-B situation

I forgot my long girth in the trailer (I found it tonight when we got home), so had to borrow a kid’s saddle that I had literally never sat in.   Murray decided he didn’t want to play in the warm up and was running out all over the place — I didn’t even jump all the warm up fences.

Then we got out on cross country proper and he turned into a MACHINE, didn’t look at a single fence twice, and we went clear (with 13 time since we did school the first water).

i bought myself an amazing hat!

Nearly half of the senior BN division was eliminated, quite a few of them in stadium, and we somehow moved up from 12th to 5th.

And then, because so many people had been eliminated, my adult team challenge ended up the last team standing and we got a NECK RIBBON!  A NECK RIBBON!!!!!!!

A TRI-COLORED MOTHERFUCKING NECK RIBBON!!!
and if you look closely at the collective comments: bucking not allowed!

We went into this weekend with simple aspirations.  I just wanted to be zen.  There was to be no freaking out about pushing for perfection in dressage or worrying about scores or placings.  We just wanted to get around XC clean and show Murray a good, non-stressful time — not freak out about minute markers or speed or circling or schooling. All we had to do for stadium was jump all the fences, and end on a number not a letter.

And we did all that and SO MUCH MORE.

he is actually not even really sweating after running
his first 6-minute xc course in a year…

There is still so much to work on, but for once I feel like Murray and I have an actual trajectory!  Instead of just muddling around at beginner novice forever, hoping that one day we’ll solve the pesky “scared of everything he’s never seen before” thing, or that with enough outings putting leg on and reminding Murray to dressage in some version of on-the-bit during a test will not necessarily result in a tantrum.

murray worked hard on stall rennovations all of friday night
but, on the upside, actually managed to flatten it all back out by laying down saturday afternoon

Full recap to come over the next few days — depending on how badly my computer actually needs to be replaced (the best kind of surprise when one arrives home).  Can I drag this show out over a whole week of blogging?  You betcha.  There is so much to say about every part, and I am trying not to forget ANY of it.

and we got to update our bingo cards!