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    Learning to Liberty
    Learning to Liberty
    Learning to Liberty
    Ebook164 pages2 hours

    Learning to Liberty

    By Stephanie Morgan

    4/5

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    About this ebook

    I was once a young girl who had never had a riding lesson.
    I lived in the city, and I dreamed.
    My dreams became bigger.

    Dreams are never a bad thing: they drive you.

    Read about my adventures from the beginning learning to train horses. I hope to inspire you through my short stories that have shaped my life and made me both a better person, and horse trainer.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherStephanie Morgan
    Release dateMar 11, 2016
    ISBN9781988186399
    Learning to Liberty
    Author

    Stephanie Morgan

    Ontario author with a strong passion for horses, and learning.

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    • 4/5
      Enjoyed her conversational storytelling and feel inspired by how she kept pushing on to achieve her dream. Also confirmed my belief that it's crazy to have boarders.

    Book preview

    Learning to Liberty - Stephanie Morgan

    Learning_To_Liberty_Cover.jpg

    Learning To Liberty

    by Stephanie Morgan

    Dedicated to the wonderful horses and people who have helped shape who I am today. Without your love, patience, and the constant new challenges and opportunities you offered me, I would have never gotten this far. For that I am forever grateful. Thank you.

    — Stephanie Morgan

    Part 1

    I don’t have too many memories of a time before horses. My family lived in a small house with a fair-sized backyard. My brothers and I lived close enough to walk to school and there were two parks nearby to play at. Cedarvale Crescent was a quiet little street but a lot of the kids who lived there were my age. This gave the neighbourhood a club feeling. In the evenings, only before dark of course, we’d play on the street. Our favourite game was kick-the-can, which is basically like tag with a can as home base. If you got past the person who was it and kicked the can over, you would win the game. The person who was it would then have to be it again. Unfortunately, I was not a very athletic kid, and so I was it often. Now I joke about how baseball is the game I hate - I cannot run fast, I cannot throw far, and I most definitely cannot catch something that is coming towards me.

    To make matters worse, I was incredibly shy. Being shy and not at all athletic often translated to the other kids as being dumb. Years later, my self-confidence is still something I need to work on and try to improve on a day-to-day basis. It’s gotten better.

    Who would have thought that a girl like me would turn into a determined horse trainer and inspiring riding coach? Not me. Not until I turned 12, anyway.

    People say that liking horses is almost a disease: you get bit by the bug and all of sudden you can’t stop thinking about them. When I was a baby my parents’ house had backed onto a race track; perhaps I was bitten quite early. But I didn’t get to take lessons until much later.

    At the age of eight I had a best friend. In retrospect Olivia was probably just an older girl on the block with a lot of patience who didn’t have the heart to say no to me. Olivia took riding lessons. While laying across her bed surrounded by artwork of horses - beautiful, big, majestic horses - she would tell me about how Daisy had taken off with her or had tried to eat the grass while they were trotting on a trail ride. As I listened to her stories, it didn’t take long for me to become completely fascinated with horses.

    When I was around nine or ten we moved to a larger city. I had been begging my parents like crazy to start riding lessons, or even just to go pet the horses - I would have done anything just to see one in real life. I’d gone on pony rides at the St. Jacobs Farmers’ market as many times as they would allow, but after we moved I had been cut off from that luxury. I was also missing Olivia like crazy, and I think in an attempt to keep me happy my parents finally gave in and found some lessons that were affordable. They had noticed a small ad in the local newspaper at a place called Red Ribbon Stables that charged $15 a lesson. This was the most affordable place around, and it seemed just fine.

    Red Ribbon Stables

    Entering the barn for the first time I was nervous. Horses were completely new to me and the horse I would be riding seemed like a giant when I first laid eyes on him. I was taught how to brush my horse and I remember thinking how am I going to remember all of this? My coach was a tall blonde lady named Mary. Mary was very strong from doing most of the barn work herself. She was loud, friendly, firm, and when she talked she had a sparkle in her eye. Even so, to me she seemed rough. I was quite young and she scared me. I noticed that when she corrected the horses her tone of voice became very loud. It wasn’t that she was mean, but she had a way about her that just wouldn’t take no for an answer. Mary’s confident way instilled confidence in the horses. For me it did something different. I couldn’t say that I was scared or that I didn’t think I could do it; I was more afraid of what she’d think of me if I failed. All I could do was try.

    During the first lesson I was too nervous to do anything; I thought I might hurt the horse or the horse might step on me. During the second lesson, as I brushed my school horse, Sunny, who was tied in his stall, he pinned me up against the stall wall. He didn’t squish me completely, but he put enough pressure on me so that I couldn’t brush him or get away. Mary found me pinned there and told me how to move him over so he couldn’t do that. Who knew he’d move over if you poked him with a bony finger in his belly? I was becoming more and more confident with the horses each time I rode, especially with knowing that the horse wouldn’t be able to pin me against the wall whenever he felt like it. And so, after the second lesson I was completely hooked.

    Over the next four years I was coached by Mary at Red Ribbon Stables. It was a small but competitive stable. I remember people coming up to me during shows and asking if certain horses were for sale. One time as I was watching Mary’s daughter warm up for a class, five different individuals came and asked me if the horse was for sale, how much I’d take for her, and if she was off of the higher circuits. This was pretty exciting, as I felt like I myself owned the horse. The horse Mary’s daughter was riding had actually been rescued from the St. Jacobs livestock exchange, which is pretty much a death trap for any horse who has gone lame or has injured a rider. The meat buyers take an average of 80% of the horses that come in each week. It’s a sad place, but also a treasure trove for people who have an eye for the right horse. There have even been some race horses who have come out of there.

    One March break on a Tuesday morning Mary brought all her students down to the auction. It was too cold to be riding, so she came up with this idea for a field trip instead. Red Ribbon Stables had their eye on a small pony who had actually been sold the night before, but we weren’t aware of the sale and thought that he was going through on that day. Everyone was quite disappointed when he didn’t go through the auction. Regardless, we still had a lot of fun there. There were horses we could easily imagine bringing home like big huge draft horses who had to duck to get into the auction ring. We saw lots of shaggy beasties, underfed horses, and ones who probably hadn’t been dewormed or had their hooves trimmed their whole lives. Some of them had actually been bred to be sold here, just like a beef cow. One horse in particular gave us all a good laugh; he came in announcing himself the second the trailer had backed up to the loading docks. He was a stud and very friendly and good looking. His conformation was decent, actually excellent in comparison to the majority of the horses there. His only fault was that he couldn’t bring his penis back up. The poor guy didn’t seem to mind, but he kept kicking it around while he trotted around looking for a friend to pay attention to him. Mary chuckled and asked us how we’d like to take that into the show ring. She was joking around saying he’d make an excellent hunter for one of us. The things we remember. You’d think a sensitive soul like myself would remember the sad truth about what was happening at the auction rather than just the funny things. We always made light of the situation, but we understood what was happening. Even though we were young Mary had told us basically what was going on at the time. She would say things like, You can’t save them all, or Who would you pick? We would then discuss why the horse in question would or would not have been suitable. We used this sad place as a learning opportunity, or at least I did. Mary had a good eye and would tell us which horses looked like they were drugged. She showed us what to watch for. I learned about conformation, colours, and breeds. I learned what a healthy horse looks like, and of course what a sick or lame horse looks like.

    Mary was a lot of fun as a coach, although I still couldn’t say no to her. I enjoyed her lessons. This was what I looked forward to the whole week - even with my once a month emergency dismount (for those of you who don’t speak horse yet, this means I fell off). There are a few falls in particular that really stood out. I can remember each fall like it was yesterday, where even the thought of them makes my heart race a little bit faster.

    During the winter we mostly trail rode, as the ring would become icy. It was nice to get out in the open rather than ride around in circles. One time right after Christmas there had been a huge snow fall with nearly a foot and a half of snow. We headed out on the trail, just me and Mary this time, and we rode out for about an hour. I was on Indie, a large chestnut pony with a large white blaze on her face and a white spot on her belly. Indie was my favourite for a long time. She had attitude, but she was pretty. Mary was on her almost three-year-old draft/thoroughbred cross named Red; she was also a very pretty horse, although a lot taller than Indie. We came up to a huge tree that had fallen down in the storm. It had to be at least three feet tall. I was about 12 years old at this point so I could ride fairly well, but jumping was still a skill in the works.

    My instructor said, Well, we’ve come this far and we’re not going to turn back - we’ll have to jump it.

    I said, I don’t think so; that’s really high. Let’s find a way around. But we couldn’t find a way around, as the bush was too thick. So then I said, Alright, you go first and I’ll follow.

    Mary said, No, no, you go first so your horse won’t try to catch up to mine.

    Fine, fair reasoning. So I picked up a slow, reluctant trot, not wanting to go over it, and really not wanting to go fast over it. And Indie was a star! She jumped over the fallen tree straight out of the slow trot, landed, and even stopped after I fell onto her neck. Like I said, jumping was still in the works. So I shimmied back into the saddle and turned around. Okay, your turn, I shouted to Mary.

    Mary kind of laughed and said, No way; I’m not jumping that!

    She reasoned that her horse was too young. Great, why hadn’t I thought of that? So I was told to come on back over. I again tried to find another way around. The bush was really that thick. Finally, I decided to try the log again. I pushed Indie into a canter this time and she cleared it perfectly, landed in canter, and I stayed with her. The look on Mary’s face was great, and it is something that will stick with me the rest of my life. When we got back to the barn Mary told everyone all about what her student had jumped and how well I’d done. She even told her

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