Now that I was getting older, owning a horse of my own was going to be expensive, which meant that I was going to have to save up for it myself, straight away it was going to be a struggle as saving was not my strong point, actually even now I can’t seem to get the hang of it.

My friend Jo used to ride a horse called Goldie, he was a lovely palomino which was kept on a farm down the road from where I lived, it was a wild thing which had been sent away to be broken in but somewhere along the way we think he kind of forgot all he was taught and by the time he came back he was still out of control, the farmer was quite upset that his granddaughter, who he originally bought Goldie for would go no where near him, so Jo was starting to ride him out. Me, well I wasn’t quite ready for a horse like Goldie yet.

Now Goldie had many fields to roam, and every time we went to get him he was always in the one farthest away, and the funniest thing was how deaf he was when we shouted his name, but he could hear you drop horse feed nuts into his bucket from four fields away, funny that. Now one day as we were walking down the field, Goldie was running up and down the far hedge neighing and whinnying, on the other side was a brown cob doing the same.

It did not take us long to find out who owned this pony, I am not saying that we were nosy, just inquisitive, she belonged to a family who had just moved in down in the valley, they had two ponies, one called Willow who was only six months old and the other called Honey who they said we were more than welcome to ride, this for me was a dream come true. We decided just to ride her in the field to start with so we could get used to each other, we ran down to their house to get her tack. They told us she was hard work to catch and best to pen her into a corner then throw a lead rope around her neck, as soon as you do this she would know that she was caught and would stand still whilst you put the head collar on her. Jo and I looked at each other and giggled, as experienced as us how hard could this be?

We had all the horses tack sat on the fence ready, Jo had the lead rope and I had the head collar, Honey took one look at us and galloped of around the field, not a good start but after about ten minutes she had calmed down ready for us to make our move, we walked up slowly behind her and started to get her penned into a corner, so far so good. Jo walked slowly up ready with the lead rope but Honey saw it coming, rearing up she span around and shot straight past us both back out into the field, OK, plan B, lets both hold the lead rope and walk up behind her. This worked a lot better and Jo got close enough to throw the lead rope over her neck, on doing this Honey stood still looking at us both as of to say, well come on then you have caught me.

Keep in mind that this is me we are talking about, you know the girl who knows everything that there is to know about horses, so at this point it was my move and I ran up behind Honey with the head collar. That day I learnt a very valuable and painful lesson. Honey must have been spooked at me running at her from behind, because just as I ran up behind her she kicked out with both legs, she caught me in the top of my leg and sent me into a flying backwards somersault, oh my God did it hurt. Jo came running over but I jumped up saying that I was OK and that it was lucky that she did not have any horseshoes on.

We decided to give up and come back tomorrow. My leg was getting tighter and tighter underneath my jeans. I just wanted to get home so I could see if it was bruised, thankfully Jo carried the tack back down to the house while I waited by the gate for her. Walking back home that day took me over a hour for a ten minute walk. As soon as I walked through the door my mum knew that something was wrong, but it was at least another half hour before I took down my jeans to expose a bruise that covered the whole of my top leg right down to my knee, it was huge, my mum had a fit and started to shout at me, which was when I burst into tears. For a whole week after that I could only wear pajamas bottoms because of the swelling, but we were soon back in Honeys field with head collar and lead rope in tow. This was another lesson that I had learnt so I would be ready when the day came when I would be owning a horse of my own.

Sometimes owning a horse of my own seemed to me like it was only going to happen when I had saved up and bought one myself, but that did not stop me from continuing to try and get one, no way! My schools activities week list soon came around and I saw on the list that they had a week at the riding school that I went to, I was so there!

Now take in mind that when I read about it I was so excited that I failed to read the whole thing well, not properly anyway. All my friends were just as  excited and because there were only a few  places it seemed to take forever for the letters to come back to say whether we had places or not. Well we all got in, how good was that, now we only had to wait six weeks till the end of term.

Activities week had arrived. On the Monday morning I got up nice and early to make sure that I had everything, I had my jeans, jumper, waterproof coat, packed lunch, and yes my wellingtons, well I have had a few lessons now and some of the things that I had been told had actually started to sink in.

We were standing in the stable yard at the riding school, there must have been twenty of us and all of us talking at the same time. Looking back now, if I had worked at the stable I would have run away like the wind that day instead of having to put up with all of us.

We were all given the name of the horse that we would be looking after for the whole week. Mine was called Andy and I could not wait to go and meet him, but before we were allowed to go and see our horses all of us were given this huge folder with our names on, and inside there was a rota to say what we would be doing throughout the day, I started to study mine, muck out and groom? Hang on a minute, I thought, when do we get to ride.

Looking over at my best friend Donna she looked as confused as me, well that made two of us that did not read it properly the first time. Now as we both stood there reading we realized that this week was all about looking after horses with a hour riding a day, that meant the other seven hours we would be working, oh well, how hard can that be.

Well I soon found out how hard. First of all we had to muck out the stables, that took us all until lunch time, and then as we walked back across the yard I realized that I could not stand up straight, my back ached so much. We sat in one of the paddocks and ate our lunch, we were all very quiet and every now and again one of us shouted out in pain as we moved the wrong way, how were we going to get through the week?

After lunch we were told that it was time for our riding lesson, great, the bit we had been all waiting for. We were told to go and get our horses and then we would be shown how to tack up. There was no way that any one of us could lift up our horse saddles so the helpers had to do it all for us, then one by one we were helped on and led to the arena.

After about fifteen minutes we were all moaning, but they kept us out there for the whole hour. My arms and legs did not feel like they were my own, and this time as I dismounted I felt my legs quiver and then give way, as I looked around in embarrassment I realized that I was not the only one. We led the horses back to the horse stables and untacked them, then we rubbed the horses down, as my horse was digging into his food I stood there aching from my head down to my toes, and I wondered how I was going to get through all of this.

Walking across the horse yard I could see my dad sat in the car, as soon as I opened the car door I burst into tears. I could not wait to get home so I could go to bed. For a long time after this owning a horse was something that I thought I could do without.

My best friend at school was under the same impression as me, one day we would be owning a horse. We made a pact together that we would save up and buy our own riding school, have loads of horses and loads of land, this I am sure kept us going through our school years and even now we are still in touch though our dream never quite happened.

“Please can I have riding lessons Mum, please” I asked again and again and again. But she kept saying No, Please, Please, Please, over and over and over again, Until she said “OK Yes” and I screamed at the top of my voice, but it did not come without a price, every night after tea and before I went out I had to do the washing up, can you believe that every single night for a one hour lesson on the Sunday. Ok so I thought it over for a good five seconds before I agreed to her terms,(I bet she thought I would say no) ha ha no way. Ok so today was Saturday and because the deal was set I made her phone up there and then to book my lesson for the next day, boy I was good.

Sunday morning arrived and I was up well early, dressed in jeans and trainers ready for my riding lesson. Dad drove me up to the stables and before he had completely stopped the car I was all ready out and running across the yard with him shouting something behind me, I turned and nodded having no idea what he said, but hoping that it looked like I did to him before I disappeared around the corner.

I booked in at the reception and waited for them to find me a hat that was the right size for me. When the lady asked me where were my wellingtons, wellingtons, I thought what for?” I explained to her that when I usually rode out I wore my trainers because they were much more comfortable, I thought that I sounded like I knew what I was on about that it did not bother me that she was grinning like a Cheshire cat at me. But I really had no idea.

She took me over to a huge barn where there was about ten kids all lined up in front of their ponies, a few of them looked scared to death of these four legged animals, and as I joined the group another pony was brought out to me, I could hardly stand still waiting for my turn to be helped on. Some of them just jumped on with ease, others struggled. Come on, come on, I thought, this is the easy part. Eventually they got to me and told me to bend my leg while they cupped it in their hands and on the count of three to jump, no problem, one, two, three. I am not sure but I don’t think that I jumped quite high enough and as I went to swing my leg over I missed and kicked my horse right behind the saddle, good job she was holding on to the lead rope, he shot forward as I fell tummy first over the saddle, she quickly tugged on the lead rope and he stopped and span around to face her, it was such a sharp spin and as I was not holding on to anything I just slipped straight over the top of the saddle and down to the ground onto the wood chippings, straight away I jumped up brushed myself off and tried to hide my beetroot colored face, not a good start.

Eventually we were all mounted up and ready to start our lesson, we were told to walk around the ring and then come down the middle and turn the other way, then we walked around doing a figure of eight, this is so easy I thought. Then the instructor said that we had to trot around the ring one at a time. How sorry I felt for my horse when it was our turn, bumb, bumb, bumb, I went. I had no idea how to do the rising trot so I just sat there like a bag of potatoes, slipping first one way and then the other, I had to grip so tight with my legs to stop me from slipping right off. My legs ached and felt really sore, so I was very thankful that we did not have time to trot around the ring the other way.

The lesson came to a end and the instructor called us all into the middle of the ring and to line up by the horse jumps that they had set out ready for their next lesson. She started to tell us what we would be doing in next weeks riding lesson, I was looking at the jumps and telling myself that in a couple of weeks I would be doing that, I was off in my own world paying no attention to what she was saying until I heard my name being mentioned, I glanced around and realized that everyone but me had dismounted, as she was helping me off I realized that I should really spend more time listening if I was to learn how to ride a horse.

Sliding to the floor my legs felt like jelly, but I managed to stand there as if I was fine, patting my horse on his neck and then threading up the stirrups so they didn’t smack against his side as he was led away. I started to walk across the horses yard to the car park but my legs were sore and burning so much, I stopped and pulled up my trouser legs to reveal two huge purple pinch marks, and said to myself from now on I think I will wear Wellingtons when I ride.

Now that I’d had a horse riding lesson and I in my mind I figured that I had learnt so much, I really thought to myself that day that it would not be long before I would be owning a horse of my own. I carried on limping to the car with a big smile on my face and thought, roll on next week.