Day 3

I had planned to lunge Danni again today, but when I got her out, J was messing with the sprinklers, so I had an opportunity.

I walked her around in the front, with the sprinklers going, cars driving past, dogs barking, all kinds of excuses to be bad. She lOOked, for all she was worth, and only jumped once, when the sprinkler spray hit her hind legs. Cutie. That's probably pretty scary, if you are a two-year-old prey animal!

Then I worked with her in the barn for a while, introducing her to truly scary things like fly spray, getting her legs brushed, and standing quietly in the cross-ties in the barn aisle. At one point, she got her foot caught on the stall mats, then whipped herself turned around in the cross-ties, and I was never so glad that we've made those break-away! So she broke them, and then was immediately quiet, and allowed me to move her back where she belonged and go on with her brushing. She forgot about her panic moment, and moved on. A good sign about how she thinks.

Tomorrow, I have a long 'ordinary day' at work, filled with the types of things that I am actively working to minimize or eliminate completely. But I should be home by 6pm, to spend a little time with this precious girl, and see what else I can find out about her. We've been joking that she is my 'midlife crisis'. I'll be 40 this year, and by the time Danni is really hitting her potential, I'll be in my early 50s. Which is maybe just a rationalization for doing what I want to do anyway... ;). She's spendy, but not THAT spendy. Just a little stretch, that shows what she might mean to me, as a present to myself. So I'll wait for Wednesday, and Trisha's input to make my final decision, but I've been working my whole life to be worthy of a horse like this one---one with the brain and the talent to go all the way to the top. I've been learning all those lessons: control over my emotions, control over my body, how to think of six legs, two backs, two necks as though they were one. And now I have more to learn, just to keep up. Isn't it great?!