My Dixie Girl

A while back I mentioned that I rode horses in my late teens. Here is my second horse, Dixie. My first horse was an ass. His name was Red and his greatest pastime was jumping fences to go visit neighboring mares.

He was castrated but that didn't stop him, he had an ego the size of Montreal.

He was replaced with dear sweet Dixie.

“Here is nobility without conceit,
Friendship without envy. Beauty without vanity.
A willing servant, yet no slave”

It describes my Dixie to a T.
This poem is on a poster my parents framed and gave me when I first moved out about 14 years ago. Yikes. That makes me feel old.

When I got her she had minimal training and frankly so did I. If you don’t know much about horses, then you might think a trained horse with an inexperienced rider might means the horse will perform to it’s highest ability.

Not even close. Us humans can really mess up a horse’s groove. Consequently, Dixie and I had our work cut out for us given that we were both in need of some serious training.

I would like to say I was patient with her and together we worked hard and achieved that magical oneness that great horsemen and women talk about.

But that would a big fat lie. If anything she is was the one that was patient with me. If you have been reading this site for a bit, you know that patience, NOT my strong suit.

But we did make great strides and she tried so hard. Often she had no clue what in the world I was asking for this time – I am positive she rolled her eyes frequently at my cockamamie attempts to improve our form – but regardless she would try and try. When she finally “got” it, bam she had it. She was a quick study and her willingness to try was unmatched.

Of course when your first experience with a horse is an ass, anything would be better. Red had attitude with or without a saddle on his back and fun was not a word I would use to describe our relationship. It was tumultuous at best and I wasn’t overly sad to see the back end of him!

Dixie and I took many a lesson together and I enjoyed them so much. I miss the challenge of working towards that next level. When I moved away to attend University, I had to sell her. I feared all the work we had done together was going to be lost if she wasn’t ridden regularly. I also felt like someone else should have the joy of owning a horse as wonderful as she.
I still miss her but Lord knows, I don’t have the time to devote right now. My dudes need me. But when they are more independent, you can bet that I’ll be getting myself a sweet little quarter horse.