Back in Tack

As per Dr. P's suggestions, I've been getting Gali back to light work under tack.  My first ride was completely uneventful, and I found myself in awe at how lucky I am to have a horse like Gali.  Really, what other horse would be completely level headed in a relatively new indoor after almost two months off?  I was able to check his soundness at three gaits in both directions, work on my two point, a few double-ups, and do some no stirrup work - all on the buckle!  Gali was enthusiastic about being back in work.

I then went away for the weekend, and returned to ride on Monday night.  I got to the farm later than I expected, and didn't have my tack room key with me.  I wanted to get some walking in, because I felt bad for leaving Gali to sit for two days.  After hand-walking him around the fog-filled and rather dark indoor, I threw a rope halter on him, rigged up some reins, took a deep breath, and hopped on.

Who is this horse?!

Mr. Galabad was... well, Galagreat.  He didn't look at anything scary towards the far end of the arena, he didn't try to jig or pop his shoulder and drag me anywhere, and he had pretty good brakes.  I did spend 95% of the ride walking, but in the short bits of trot (to check his soundness), he was just as well behaved as in the walk. Needless to say, I was confused - who is this horse?!  Last time I rode him bareback in his bridle, he tried to take off with me, and bucked!

I was happy he decided to behave, and even happier to see that he seems to be improving at the trot.  I suspect with another week of MSM, DMSO, and walking, he'll be sound again... just in time to have a few weeks off when I'm home for the holidays!

I went out today, excited to be able to throw tack on my well mannered horse and go for a stroll.  I was hoping that the ground had dried up enough to ride outside, but it was still too muddy for me to be comfortable working at all.  I'm glad I had to ride inside, though, because the Gali of the past week has disappeared, and the usual Galahad was back in full force.  Before I had even gotten my feet in the stirrups, he was spooking away from a jump standard that must have been hissing at him.  He was jumping at the sound of a horse pawing, and sidestepping to move away from standards and jumps that he's seen several times already.  I tried to get him to walk up to the one particular standard he was afraid of, but he tensed up and spun away three or four times.  Since my goal is to work him gently under saddle, I felt bad for getting into an argument with him.  We met somewhere in the middle, and I continued my ride.  He was strong, and tense for most of the ride, and was looking for any excuse to misbehave.  I'm assuming that his tension is what led to his lameness being more pronounced than it was on Monday.

Afterwards, I did some ground work in the scary part of the arena, and he seemed to settle down.  I'm certainly hoping that today was a fluke, and the calm and levelheaded Gali is what I will begin to see more of as I bring him back into work slowly.