I had left school and got a myself a job, owning a horse of my own now became my mission. But being a young sixteen year old things did not quite go to plan, instead of getting a horse I got myself a boyfriend, but as luck would have it he to was very interested in horses to.

Now Granny had quite a few horses which she could not manage all at once, so she asked my boyfriend Peter and I if we would be interested in taking one of her horses on loan, we could keep him stabbled there and it would cost us £20 a week.

We worked out all of our out going expenses just to make sure that we could afford him, his vet bills, and his food, as soon as we realised that we could we went round to Grannys to accept. Finnally I would be owning a horse, well sort of. I could not wait to go and ride Harcombe.

Harcombe was a fifteen-two cob cross horse, he used to be a hunting horse but he was getting on a bit now so was retired from hunting, which was how Granny came to have him. Now the thing with Harcombe was that he was very set in his ways, for example, if he did not want to go a certain way then he would drop his left shoulder, rear, and then spin round and head back to his stable. Not a very nice trait that he had picked up, but at least Granny had warned us both about it.

The first day that we owned Harcombe Peter went out riding with Granny, all went very smoothly and Harcombe was very well behaved. The next day it was my turn, but because Granny was riding out over the common I decided, as it was my first time, just to do a little bit of horse road work with him so that we could check each other out.

I decided to go up the lane opposite my parents house and then around the block, Peter said that he would wait for me to go past and then meet me at the stables. Of I went without a care in the world, riding a horse that sort of belonged to me. What could go wrong?

We went up the lane, and about half way up I let him have his head, he broke out into a canter, it was such a good feeling, and getting to the end I was so tempted to go back and do it again, but knowing that Peter was waiting for me at our check point I decided against it and carried on down towards the road.

Turning the corner we walked down the hill and onto the road, there coming towards us was a group of three horses. Now coming from a stable with a lot of horses Harcombe thought that these were his friends and started to trot towards them, I pulled him back into a walk and let him sniff the other horses whilst I engaged in conversation, but as soon as I asked him to walk past he started to throw his head about. I knew this was the sign for him to drop his shoulder, so before that happened I tightened my reins and gave him a hard kick, he shot forward, a little surprised that I knew his little trick, and he started to trot along the road.

I was so pleased with myself that I let him trot till I met up with Peter. I could not wait to tell him how I’d mastered the horse. Peter just looked at me when I had finnished telling him and told me not to get too cocky. As if. I told him that I would see him in about half an hour and began trotting off to finnish my ride.

Being sat up on harcombe made me feel so tall, I could see for miles across the fields, it was great, I loved that feeling. Anyway getting back to my ride. I was just getting to the top of the estate which was about half way round. I remember singing away without a care in the world, so what the little bugger did next took me completley by surprise. He did not drop his shoulder. He just froze, then span round and jumped up on all fours. As soon as his feet landed he took off flat out in a full gallop, I screamed and yelled at him, when you think about it that probably did not help, but at that point I remember being absoultley terrified, I yanked on the reins but nothing happened, well it did, he got faster. The fifteen minute walk that I had planned just flew passed in thirty seconds, and all I kept praying was that we did not meet anyone coming the other way.

Before I knew it I was whizzing passed my parents house, looking back I suppose it was quite funny, seeing three faces at the window as I shot passed, my arms and legs not far behind. At the time I can asure you it was no laughing matter. As soon as harcombe got back to the yard he stopped and casually just walked into his stable, and I swear it took ages for me to untangle his mane from my fingers so that I could dismount.

As soon as I saw Peter running up the yard I burst into tears, I swore that I would never ever ride Harcombe again and that he had to go back. But of course that did not happen, and I did ride him again. At that moment he was the closest thing I had to owning a horse of my own.

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