GROWING UP

BEEN A WHILE since I sat my bum on a pony. I was mad keen; well, to the point of being woken up at 5am, and agreeing to the proposal of learning the 5E dressage test on the way to the ODE if someone else cleaned my tack. I think the grandeur of events was kind of lost on me. I was personally convinced that I just wanted to spend time with my pony. But gawd help anything or anyone who came between me and a blue ribbon. Except me, and my lack of "dedication"; who needed that - I was there on my pony. I won. Simple. Except for when I didn't; then I was genuinely convinced I should have; and baffled as to why I didn't!

Thirty years later, I've just had a conversation with my mother about a "jump" that was famous in our family, primarily because it was captured by a photographer. Even having removed myself from the horse scene 20 or so years ago - likely longer - I understand fully what my mother is saying. The photo is of me on - what I know now to be - a very green pony. He was lovely. Compliant; but naughty enough to have personality. Happy to be around humans - including vets, who had to treat an enormous haematoma after a youthful greeting to a gate.

He was 14 hands. On a hill. Let's go with 13.3 and a half; even Stonehenge appears larger in hindsight. Athletic. And beautiful; a dark dappled grey in his youth, lightening somewhat in his age. In some ways, he was the Jamaican Bobsled Team of ponies - should have been ungainly and impossible; but behaved as a true hack, despite what the true "hack" on his back threw at him.

The photo in contention is of me, launching my little Guin over a HUGE set of truck tyres. Not little 3-tonne truck 185-85-16s; but MASSIVE B-Double truck tyres. Or possibly tyres off those monsters you see in quarries. They had to have been four feet tall. See above for "almost 14 hands". He cleared them with aplomb. But, without a developed musculature, nor any real form of jumping education. I didn't know what I was doing; I was his guide; how the heck was he supposed to know what he was doing? He just did it, because I asked. Such a lovely man. Silly, but lovely.

Guin wasn't my first love. To be honest that was Coney. Coney the Pony. What a beaut section A; game for all day action - trotting around, bumbling over cavaletti taking care of her junior charge. Stood like a rock; and would put up with anything - down to distracted kids "bathing" her for a show or gymkhana (or one day event; those were a favourite! For us, anyway. Coney's opinion was reserved - not a joyous thing; more a "yeah, OK, if that's what you want, I'll make sure you're safe" thing.)

Amongst the others, there was Pattie. Ripple Brook Dame Pattie. Me; but a horse. Mum (and Dad) spotted her at an All Welsh Show at the RMS when I was, maybe, nine. I might have been ten. She was going through the Welsh Sale on the Saturday night. I think mum was a little bit excited by her. She (the pony, not mum!) was only three, if I remember. Maybe four. But I went to meet her mid-afternoon in her stall in the old Clydesdale Pavilion. Next to the wood chop lawn. And the BIG SLIDE. (That if you were careful - who wasn't as a ten year old? - you could take a bread crate up to the top, and launch yourself off for the free ride of the century while the WPCS BBQ was going on over closer to the dog pavilion).

Anyway; Pattie. Though my memory is hazy - I was offered a "ride" of before the sale (might have been after). Bareback. "Good temperament". Apparently that was true. Unbroken, didn't mind a ten year old on her back squirming with delight as mum told me "Yours, until I need her".

Pat had an accident a couple of years later. Hooning around the paddock, she braked a bit late into a patch of mud. Peeled a lovely triangle of flesh off her face; just below both eyes, down to about an inch above her nostrils. Stood serenely - possibly drug induced - while seemingly hundreds of stitches were applied to reattach her face to her … well, face. Forever bore a little silver arrow just below her eyeline; the scar was almost invisible; except for the little notch on her brow. I was convinced she was going to die. She was convinced it meant she was going to get a good feed. She won.

The stoic acceptance of the injury was Pat all over. Her hooning around the paddock was the "inner" Pat. So gentle; and accepting; and generally silly. Still a woman I admire. Time for kids; time for fun. And time for food. :) And her kids were gorgeous; every last one of them.

I remember (possibly now would be classified as horrid or even illegal behaviour) using her as a diving board. After a one-day-even at the shared Kyabram/Tatura PC ODE site at Waranga Basin, we went for a swim off the pebbled "beach" next to the cross country course. Pat walks in, up to her flanks (she belied her suspected Connemara heritage - wasn't afraid of a bog, unless there was a ribbon in the offering; then she was petrified of them); encouraged her in to the point she was swimming; me, quickly over her flank, and … diving platform. I hasten to add, she was free rein at this stage, and she was just wombling around in the water, not distressed, nor drowning. A quick swim over from each flank; and back to shore.

I guess all this rambling is to demonstrate that even if your kids don't share the *true* passion of ponies or horses, they still value the memories you - and the ponies - can give them. And it teaches immeasurably valuable life skills; even if some of those lessons are harsh ones - injuries, even death. I wouldn't do my life over without the love and responsibility my ponies taught me. Thanks mum. And dad (for building the float, the horse truck, the various vehicles, the stables, fences and gates; paths and lane ways; painting the house green; the personal TARDIS (even though it was actually a fire hose house and red), and Wonder Woman's plane, and the topless VW. Yes; I ran it into the gate at the end of the lane way. Sorry.).

Lara and Mithril Guinea.

Sire: Twyford Skylight (Imp UK)

Dam: Gemma

Photo: Gary Jameson

Lara and Mithril Guinea.

Sire: Twyford Skylight (Imp UK)

Dam: Gemma

Lara and Ripple Brook Dame Pattie.

Sire: Forestland Amos (Imp UK)

Dam: Bobbie

Lara and Ripple Brook Dame Pattie.

Sire: Forestland Amos (Imp UK)

Dam: Bobbie

Photo: Helen Sloane