the art of horse riding - a trip down memory lane. Sept. 3, 2010.

the daredevil in me

I was always a very physically agile child, and felt comfortable at the top of a tall tree, or swinging from a rope swing that we had in our barn loft.  In this picture, we are practising this little horse riding 'feat', for the annual parade in our town. We often rode horses in the parade, but this year we were going to do something surprising and spectacular.  ( I am the one standing at the back, and the others are my brothers and sisters.)

This work horse, which my dad did use at the time, for pulling hay racks and wagons, was a very gentle soul with children. He would step so carefully, to give you the best smooth ride.  He would go slowly and carefully. And because of the width of his back, it was a most comfortable ride, almost like being on a big and comfortable cushion.

But if an adult rode him, he became suddenly very obstinate and difficult to control. He would try to rub the rider off, by passing very near the trees or bushes. And he had other tricks, like giving you a 'hard and uncomfortable ride', by making it as rough as he could.  And his main aim, with an adult or older person, was to gallop straight back to the barn!   

His name was King.  The other member of the horse team was his mother, whose name was Silver.  And he always hated being separated from her, even for a short ride. In order to take him out for a ride, his mother had to be out on the ride too! Otherwise he would make the most awful sounds, and he would snort, and rear  up on his back legs  and paw the air., until  they were together again.

He weighed one tonne! (1 long (or gross) ton = 2240 pounds (UK). We were proud to say that it was the UK tonne and not the American ton .


 So he was not an animal to 'play with', unless of course you were a little child. Then his personality became so gentle and kind and he was always very reliable. That is why we were using him for our ultimate act!

  However, as fate would have it, this trick did not get past the practice phase, as suddenly the whole line of little children started to slide to one side, and we all ended up on the ground.  I don't know what caused that to happen that day, as we had done this before quite successfully.  So, that was the beginning and end of our acrobatic stage!  We never tried anything like that again, at least not on the back of a horse! ( We did enter the parade with all the same children on the horse, but I was sitting this time, too.)

Just as an extra detail, we liked to ride this horse, sitting backward,  just for fun. And he would continue nicely on his way, going around the familiar yard, quite obediently.  And when we wanted to guide him back to the barn, we would turn around again, this time facing the correct direction, and give him the command to go back to his beloved barn!

This all seemed perfectly normal and just plain fun to us, at that time. Looking back on it now,  I realize that as children we were given a lot of freedom!

( You can see that there have been no new paintings. Instead, I have been house cleaning, and going through drawers that contain a great deal of family history!)