Category Archives: horses, dogs & more

Aug9

Nelson time

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I haven’t seen Nelson for over a month.  Today, I got to spend some delicious time with him.  When I got out of the car and called to him, his ears went up and he stood at the fence, waiting.  It felt like no time had passed – that we had seen each other just yesterday.  We mostly hung out in his stall, away from the flies and out of the sun.

I got to thinking about time, and wondering about how Nelson experiences time.  I thought about Jon Katz’s book Rose in a Storm, and how he describes Rose as seeing her world in maps.  I wonder if time is also a map and if for Nelson, when I am not there, I am just not in his time map.  Is there is a piece missing, or if when i do appear, then maybe the map – both space and time – has an overlay of me for an hour or so.

I have written a lot about horse time, but usually what I mean that they are not clock watching, or ticking off the minutes until the next thing happens.  It is more seamless, I suspect, more like an inner canopy of sky-spaciousness.  I wonder about experiencing time-space as vast and unmeasured.

I have had glimpses of that in meditation, but I imagine that the animal experience is even more unfettered than that.

What do you think (feel)?

 

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Aug6

helping horses, helping humans

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I love working with horses and their humans.  Most of what goes wrong with horse and their humans is not in the saddle.  It happens on the ground.  it happens in the stall.  It happens on the way from one place to another.  A lot of it has nothing to do with the horse at all.  It has to do with things that are older and deeper that make their way into the relationship with the horse.  It is rarely intentional or malicious.  It often has to do with a lack of awareness, or regard, or attention or understanding.

Most often what I do starts with movement observation.  I watch how the person moves around the horse, how the horse responds to them, to its environment, to the various parts of tacking up, leading, riding.  I watch.  And then bit by bit, I start to decode the dance.  What is working?  What is confusing?  What is missing?

Much of what I do has to do with bringing both horse and human more fully into their bodies, and then more fully into connection with each other.  That makes for a better relationship.  And usually it makes for a better ride.  Happier horse, happier human.  I love that.

If you want help, you can contact me here.

Jul27

performance!!!

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Amado and Summer rehearsing with dancers Deanna Pellecchia and Chandrika Carl-Jones

Saturday afternoon is the Annual Gala for Little Brook Farm in Old Chatham, NY.  Dancers Ingrid Schatz and Chandrika Carl-Jones will be dancing with Amado, the Mustang and his rider, Summer Brennan. That dance is part of a series of performance events that begin at 4 pm.

Amado has been lovingly trained by Summer over the past three months.  He has gone from a completely green, completely wild horse to being a calm, balanced horse with an extraordinary tolerance and trust for all things human.  Summer rides him bridleless and bareback for our performance.

More photos of rehearsals here.

You can get tickets for the Gala by calling 518-821-5506.  Hope to see you there!