The Most Important Lesson
As I became a working student, I had people try to persuade me to take a different path. In other words, I had people who tried to tell me not work in this industry. Those people told me, with an all-knowing tone of voice and a sparkle of wisdom in their eye, that horses really are a lot of work, and that wouldn’t it be better to pay someone else to do the dirty work and enjoy your nice, clean, trained, horse on your days off? And despite the fact that I was seeing just how challenging aspects of this industry really were, I also saw how much I was gaining. I relished the work. I knew what it was like to get up at three in the morning to work for free, to groom someone else’s horses, to wash pony legs even when I couldn't feel my freezing hands. I was living the reality of making sure all the horses are comfortable, even though I hadn’t eaten in six hours, nor sat down, nor stopped moving since I woke up. I lived that and I still saw it as the path I preferred.
Everyone works for a different reason. Perhaps that is too broad. Rather, everyone works with different intentions. I work with an intention that seems rare; I work for work’s sake. I do not work to make a living, although I do need to make money doing this. I do not work to pass the time, although I need to spend my time doing something. I do not work because I am told I have to. I work because I love it. I work because I need it, because it gives me purpose, conviction, solace. When I work, I don’t just work for someone else, I work for myself; myself and the horses.
I began to see that there was an essential bond that was lacking between a horse and rider that were just that: a horse and a person that rides it. The true bond comes from the in-between. The meditative moments in the morning when the horses have just been feed. The sun streams through the windows and doors, the cool air smells of hay and grain, and the only sounds are of morning bird song and munching horses. The sounds of horses eating tell me everything is right with the world. Its the little things you can only notice if you groom, feed, and see a horse every day. I could list the tiniest, most minuet details about every horse in my care. And I wouldn’t have it another way. I know them as the funny, quirky, shy, or inquisitive individuals they are. If you come to ride a horse and nothing else, you miss the best parts. You miss the sleepy eyes and yawns when you turn on the lights for night check. You would never know that one horse really only drinks out of its left bucket, or that another likes coffee so much he will lick it out of your cup. And I know, because I have worked with clients who have the “ideal horse life”. They show up in luxury cars to their immaculate, well-trained horse tacked up and ready for them. They get on and have a lesson with the best trainer money can buy, and yet there is always something missing. I saw that almost immediately in my work. It is the moments in-between that make the riding great, otherwise everything takes place on a purely mechanistic level.
There are many many things I learned in my years as a working student. But at the most fundamental level, I realized I wanted do this as a profession. I didn’t just love riding horses, I loved caring for horses. I loved getting to know horses, each one of them. I wanted my job in this world to be knowing, understanding, and caring for horses. I didn’t want that to be something fun I did on the side, that could never be enough. I wanted all of this.