Remember the days when your brain could tell your body to do something, and your body would snap to it, saying, “Right! Got it. No worries!” I do. Back when I was in my late thirties, riding usually four to five days a week, and working with a riding coach once a week, my body was constantly in a low-level state of soreness — in a good way. It told me I had worked, used muscles, and my body had done, or tried valiantly to do, anything my little brain had asked. That state of being, my body totally in tune with my brain, made it possible to be in tune with the mind and body of the animal under me. Well, okay, maybe not all the time. But those times when my gelding, Tristan, seemed to know what I wanted before I asked, and we seemed to be sharing one body, are the most sublime moments I’ve ever had on a horse. You can’t describe the feeling to anyone. Seriously, you could use a thousand words, and it wouldn’t come close to describing that measure of connectedness to another creature. It rocks your world.
Jump two decades, add a ten year hiatus from riding, a new horse, and you have a totally different story. And, lest you get the wrong impression, I’m still in pretty good shape for my age. I’m not overweight, have no health issues, and work outdoors in a large garden. But that’s not riding. Riding is balance, sensitivity, and the constant search for that illusive connectedness. When you haven’t done it for a long time, and you start again, things get frustrating. Your brain, reaching back to previous experiences, starts yelling at your body, “Do this...no, no, you idiot, this, this!” Your body, asked to use muscles it hasn’t twitched in years, whines back, “Huh?...Whah? Oh, move these legs where? Are you sure?” Body procrastination.
In the meantime, my poor horse, Delight, is wondering what the heck is going on up there. And I must admit, our first ride did not start off auspiciously. After a few turns around the round pen, me flopping like a beached flounder, my saddle went sideways and I ended up on the ground. Delight stood there looking at me like I was a total imbecile, falling (pun intended) for the old “bloating like the Goodyear blimp when she tightens the girth” trick. Okay, lesson learned.
We’ve had many rides since then, and I have started working with two different coaches when I can, but I’m still waiting for my body to catch up to my brain. May take a while. My brain remembers how things should feel, where legs, seat, hands should be. Body...not so much. It’s coming back, slowly, and when we’re out of the winter weather, which makes riding hard because the ground is so slippery, things will improve quicker as I put in more saddle time.
But even with the riding I have done so far, the change in my body is already clear. My upper body strength is improving (all that stall cleaning, wheelbarrow pushing, horse grooming), my leg strength is better, and answering “the call” a bit quicker (currently that may be wishful thinking on my brain's part), and I’m starting to feel the first inklings of that constant, low-level state of soreness, which tells me this old body is still willing to work.
Actually, this old body is pretty damned happy. I still have a LONG way to go. My balance is still precarious. I still get frustrated when I know where a leg, hand, or my balance should be, and I can’t quite get there. Or worse, get it there for a nanosecond, but can’t hold it. Delight is still waiting for me to catch up, and gets understandably annoyed when she tries to give me what she thinks I’m asking for, when I’m actually asking for something else but giving mixed signals. I admire that she tries.
Come summer things will improve faster. Better weather means more riding time at home, going to events, and getting out on the trail. Soon my brain will snap to my body, “Do this, this, and this, and then this!” And my body will answer, ‘Right! Brilliant. Great idea!”
Delight will be thinking, “Gawd, it’s about time. I was beginning to worry you’d never catch up.”
(Note on the picture. It's a sketch I did in a journal, and the red text is bleeding through from the back side of the page. But I thought the drawing fit the subject, so posted it anyway, faults and all. The handwritten title slightly cut off reads, "Self-Portrait With Manure Fork")
