Chester's Blog: 2006

Monday, 25 December 2006

My birthplace

This is me last summer at Brick House Farm, Debden. Believe it or not this is the farm I was born at 19 years ago and this was my first pasture. The stable I was born in has been converted to an office.
Karen remembers coming to see me the first day I was born. She trained me for what I am today.

This is where we tacked up at Brick House Farm.

Self Loading

This is a picture competition. It is Christmas Day 2006 and I thought I would treat him to a Christmas present by loading myself without his attention or that horse whisperer Texan who drove me craxy with his psychoanalysis. The reason there is a tarpaulin over the landrover is down to me trying to eat the bonnet to lick off the salt it had picked up from the road.

He wasn't too pleased - said I had made a damn mess of the vehicle. No pleasing some people I had loaded myself after all.

A stable point of view

I am going to be quite upfront about this. I have yet to be convinced about this horse riding business. He calls it his hobby horse business. That’s pretty damn condescending don’t you think. I didn’t even get consulted. You see I had a pretty easy ride – so to speak – over the last few years. I got lame hunting – more on that later – and then I spent the next 10 years left to my own devices. I think they call it put out to grass. So what that meant was that I got belly fat in the summer and limped around more than usual as I was so overweight. In the winter I had to survive on meagre rations and felt I had shed one too many pounds of flesh. OK he did start feeding me over the fence surreptitiously when he saw me out in the field behind his study all iced up one January morning. I hadn’t seen hard food in years. It brought tears to my eyes. I don’t know what prompted this sudden act of kindness on his part. His not known aboutb here for being that nice. One day I heard voices in the yard. I overheard my owner, John, the local farmer who owned the four of us, saying he’d let him – that was my new owner to be – take me out for gentle walks. I was not under any circumstances to be trotted. It was darned uncomfortable at first. Imagine you haven’t been ridden for a decade and then you are saddled up and expected to perform like a show horse I mean, even then, a year ago I was 19 years old, written off by my owner and formally classed as a veteran. John had never forgiven me for kicking him in the head just above the eye and him being carted off to hospital. I never got another chance. Silly idiot had picked up a metal bar close to my hind quarters while I was napping, I woke up and struck out in self defence. It was only natural but John didn’t see it that way. From then on I was right down his pecking order. Anyway back to the riding .The two of us stumbled around a few fields very slowly for a few weeks together and I was limping like hell. Then I heard him tell Julie who John let ride his pampered and all nicely stabled and trimmed “Winston” that I was going to become his pet project. By the way Winston really got my goat. He used to whinny jokes at my expense to Atlanta, a real lame bitch – literally and loony Jupiter. But yes he was going to walk me back to full fitness. What arrogance. What did he know about horses. Apparently he hadn’t ridden seriously for 40 plus years, since he was a wild child that used to race his mother’s Arab ponies bare back until they dropped with fatigue. Never had a riding lesson in his life or opened one of those DIY horse care books either. And what’s more he had just messed up his back. He had been over to these riding stables where a bunch of middle aged ladies take the liveried hunters out for exercise each week. They put him on their wildest horse as a sort of sport and poor fool didn’t see it coming. He stopped the horse alright but only after it had done a full rodeo display and then he heard this rifle crack – that was one of vertebrae cracking. Fool he got back on and still came down to ride me two days later. But I could see he was struggling to pick my hooves and he seemed to get worse over the next couple of weeks. Then I didn’t see him for a while. He had gone to the chiro and she had sent straight to the hospital for an X ray and he was instructed not to ride for at least six weeks. Oh I did see him he did keep coming to feed me. Today I am a super fit specimen for a 20 year old chestnut (that Texan says I am sorrel whatever that means)I am a Welsh Cob / thoroughbred. Longest he took me out for was an 11 hour ride in October. We left in the rain and the dark and came back in pitch black dark. He was really wiped out. And I have been out hunting again after an absence of 12 years. That really got my blood going and I scared the pants out of him. I decided to take the reins so to speak. Silly fool the Texan had told him to show up in a half bridle and snaffle but then he had never been hunting and starting on the biggest jumps hunt was not a good place to learn especially as I don’t think he had even jumped anything before other than a ditch. To give him his due he stayed on board and we went swimming in a lake to celebrate our survival. Anyway I am meant to be writing about this hobby horse business – HorseAffairs he calls it. How pretentious clearly an appeal to those middle class middle aged horsy women he surrounds himself with. And oh there’s that bridleways nonsense that he gets the TV and Radio people to cover. But HorseAffairs. He’s got this home made website he spends every night trying to construct. There’s this dreadful picture of me he put up n the About Us section outside this pub where I look as if I have just down two marathons – covered in sweat and with head slumped and him on top. Silly fool he had arranged to meet his mother and uncle for lunch at the end of a four hour ride that took us five so as he didn’t want to be late we had to gallop the last two hours. His mother does know about horses like really know but he won’t listen to a word of her advice. More’s the pity for me. So what got this business into his head was meeting Mark the upholsterer. He’d got this old chair that needed fixing and Mark came and gave him a quote. He couldn’t believe the price and Mark explained it was because of the stuffing. So he thought it would be funny to offer his own supply of horse hair – my old winter coat I assume. That got them off to talking about horses. Mark and his partner are avid riders – whiz around the world on riding holidays but haven’t found anything comparable here in the UK. So when we were off on one of our next long distance endurance rides he starts musing about this new project. Project number one now complete ie me being a super fit long distance ride he needs another challenge – not content with his planned assault on St Petersburg this summer on his sailing yacht in the Baltic. Last year I did get some peace and quiet while he went charging up to somewhere close to the Arctic circle with Roger and this American woman. So then I hear him talking to Bridget about it. She’s a real sweetie and looks after me when he is away. She wears her stirrups longer than him. She is far less demanding and content with an hour or two of riding – doesn’t have to be a whole day in the saddle each time. The two of us are in synch. Anyway he is off to buy another couple of horses. He says he’s got the horse bug – whatever that means. But now he is only playing at working with this consultancy business that only seems to operate when he’s not sailing or riding so he’s not quite so flush. Says he needs a bit of horse income to defray the costs of the three of us. Well if you do decide to put two of them into livery for goodness sake !

Chester's Blog

Monday, 25 December 2006

My birthplace

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A stable point of view

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