Mind Your Melon!

"Am I wrong for thinking out the box from where I stay?
Am I wrong for saying that I choose another way?
I ain't trying to do what everybody else doing
Just cause everybody doing what they all do
If one thing I know, I'll fall but I'll grow
I'm walking down this road of mine, this road that I call home"

-Am I Wrong by Nico & Vinz

So there is this hash-tag trending in the equestrian world and its #mindyourmelon. Thanks Jimmie and Dom Schramm for this awesome war declaration. It makes me furious when people are like "Nah, I'm not gonna where a helmet because (enter whatever idiotic reason)." Like come on guys, lets be smart. I know that most my current generation are losing braincells by the minute and wouldn't understand the consequences, but the thought being comatose or dying is an utterly petrifying thought. I'll put the link into Evention's video on not wearing a helmet at the end of this blog.

Okay, I'll get off my soapbox now. Though the reason I was on it was because Chatt Hills didn't really go as planned. 

Dressage and Stadium were great. My test was better than my one at Greenwood which was good. We got the same score, but Heather and I felt it was better. Stadium was great; we had a double clear round and one of the fastest times of the night. 

Cross country was going pretty well until 12ab. This was the hardest combination on the course. It was a skinny on top of a small mound then three or four strides to a left handed corner. We had tripped going over the skinny and just couldn't get to the corner. Similar issue that happened at Greenwood. We'll fix it thought, I'm determined. The water however is where we crashed and burned, literally. 

It was an abc combination with a down bank being a, an up bank being b and a house two strides away being c. We had gotten down the down bank into the water and were approaching the up bank when we got to the base to take off and tripped going up the bank. We were both falling to the ground when Mystic managed to keep herself from falling and trampling me. She then proceeded to step over me. I was afraid she was going to take off because she had never heard my air vest deploy, but she didn't. People started running toward me and yelling at me to stay on the ground because they thought the noise that my vest made when it deployed was my skull and helmet making contact with the ground. I had to tell them "she's spooky, get me out from underneath her, but if she spooks she'll step on me." Which would have sucked because she had huge studs in. People came up to me the rest of the day and continually told me it looked like she was protecting me. I have a picture that Laura Szeremi, a friend of mine who was at the show, took. I'll post it at the end. 

Being in between your horses front legs is a terrifying experience. I wouldn't recommend it. I'm fine so is Mystic, I promise. We are both a little sore. I have a nice case of whiplash. I just gotta say, I love my pony. Will Faudree said once: "There's an old saying in the horse world: if you got a good mare, you'll never have anything better. I totally agree with that." Mares, especially Arabian mares, have to find that one person that they trust to be able to be an amazing horse. I am that person for Mystic.

Injuries could have been a lot worse if I hadn't of had protective gear on. Wear your helmet even if your trail riding. 

Its break time for us. We will come back and try again in August with traveling to Santa Fe for a prelim and Colorado for the CCI after New Mexico. I get that it's gonna take me longer. It's cool, I don't mind. I wont be doing Texas Rose because I have to take the SAT. Kinda gotta start prepping for college. I'll continue to update as the summer goes on after Mystic and I take a bit of a vacation. I'll be at Area V Young Rider Camp in June as a counselor. We'll continue to go up to Mike's and may very well go spend some time with Christine, the girl who broke Mystic. It should be a fun summer :)

Until next time guys!

Evention Video 

This is why I love my pony. #protectionatitsbest

First One Star Down!

"You and I
We don't wanna be like them
We can make it till the end
Nothing can come between
You and I
Not even the Gods above can
Separate the two of us
No nothing can come between
You and I" 

-You and I by One Direction

Ew cheesiness! I'm not a big fan of mushy, gushy romantic stuff (okay, maybe a little bit), but I do have to say that song has a fitting ring to my weekend. Sorry, I try to make ya'll laugh at least once or twice in these thing. Stephens are notorious for their dry humor.

Okay! So, uh, Greenwood happened and I finished. 

It was a pretty good weekend, well for the most part. 

Dressage was awesome. I was so happy, and we put in one of our best test. Which in my opinion, at a one star, is a pretty good place to do that. Unfortunately, I was on first after the test ride. So naturally, my score was gonna be somewhat good, but somewhat bad. I got a sixty. Which isn't terrible for my first one star, but there was a 9.5 point difference between judges. But whatever, what the judges think the judges think. Its not a big deal. I came out and both Mike and Heather were smiling so I felt we did like at least a little bit good. 

Cross country was amazing EXCEPT for the minor miscommunication between mommy and pony to where Mystic didn't see a skinny that came after a giant log going down a hill until like ya know a good three feet until the base. Sorry baby. So we had what I call a drive by. Not a greeny beeny stop or a dirty stop, but more like a OH HEY! LOOK! THERES A JUMP THERE! Yeah...so my fault.... it's been six days since Saturday and I'm still beating myself up. But she was so great everywhere else! GAH! Rider errors suck...

And stadium, well stadium was amazing as well to where I walked out and Mike was like "Makes yesterday suck worse huh?" Uh yeah... just a little bit Mike. And its not like he was   disappointed in me or my horse; he was just upset it happened. He told me he didn't know if we were actually going to be able to do this and that I proved him wrong. He also told me that I had progressed so much since we started in Florida in January, but like grrrrr! 

Ya know, I come off and people are like how was she? I'm starting to get tired of telling people my horse was great and my score not showing it. I feel like its making me a liar. 

But needless to say it was a good weekend minus the run out. What this does mean is that we get to wait one more year for young riders. I don't want to push my horse to qualify, but its just kinda disappointing. We are still going to Chatt Hills for experience but then we are going to take a break until August and hit up Santa Fe HT and Colorado CCI*. 

I always have my nose in a book, and so before dressage I was reading The Shadowhunter's Codex which is like a companion novel, guide thing to a series I'm like royally obsessed with. So I was reading of my tack trunk, book in my lab, my beats on listen to a classical playlist I have before I ride dressage, and I come across a quote I will most likely live by for the rest of my life. It was: "Do not shrink from battle. Have faith, seek courage." Now yes, this is from a world where if you are afraid of the battles with demons you will most likely die, but just stop and think about what we do. We (or at least most of you reading this) are eventers. We jump over solid objects running 25-45 MPH on a living breathing thing that could KILL us. I mean, if we do shrink from the battle we fight everyday in our riding, the hobby and career we have set ourselves up in would end. I'm not sure why this quote stuck with me, but it did. Maybe it is because I'm tired of things not really going the way I want to, and it reminds me that things happen for a reason and one day I will make the team and everything will be okay. But don't get me wrong; I love Mystic and I love what we do, and I choose to bring up a young horse on my own. If waiting is the price I have to pay I'll do it, but I am a teenager and I do have insecurities. 

Okay there was my nerdy self doubt moment. You probably wont see one for like another two years. Well the self doubt thing. I'll forever be a nerd ;)  

Anyway guys, I appreciate you all for being supportive of Mystic and I and being there from the start. My video of the weekend is up so I'll add a link to that. I do have a question though: Do you guys want me to continue this blog and keep sharing my experiences? If so let me know in the little comment thingy on the blog or comment on the Facebook link. I will post after Chatt. We leave this Wednesday and Mystic has been awesome up here at Mike's :)

Here is the video link! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdNDZuF_230 (And where my run out was, I promise I did go back over it, but RNS didn't put it in the video)