I haven’t written in a while. Things are busy around here – work, moving, a broken heart. You know, life.

Talo and I are celebrating 6 years together these days. Well, he doesn’t really give a fuck, but I am just happy that he’s still with me, annoying the shit out of me on a daily basis. I really love this horse of mine…

We’ve been riding exclusively on a bareback pad. A saddle fitter that came to the stables a few months back said that the custom saddle is bad for his back, and I have no intention of buying a new saddle right now. So bareback pad it is. It’s not always easy for me, since I can’t do any posting trot, but I got used to it, and I think it may have improved my seat further. Our rides are not very demanding, mostly. We do a 20-minute hack around the stables, then go to the arena for 20-25 more minutes. Sometimes Talo feels a bit tired, so I don’t push him very hard, but he still does a great deal of exercises, like leg yield, flying change, side-pass and even traver (well, sometimes).

His back is fine, but he does have some issues with the carpus on his left front leg. The chiropractor is working on that, we’ll see how it goes. No lameness or anything, thankfully. Still giving him Devil’s Claw, I wonder if he still needs it at all.

We still work on desensitizing, and although his core spookiness is still there, he’s improved so much, it’s incredible. We pass crows and plastic bags, we explore the paths of the stable, we open gates and he even lets me adjust the girth of the pad without dismounting.

Mounting is still tricky at times, especially now, since we’re using the bareback pad, and I don’t have any stirrups to mount from. Still, it’s a lot better than it used to be.

Today we were even braver than usual and went completely outside, to the fields. It required going through a new, tight path, which Talo negotiated like a champ (after one refusal), and no panicking because of the new view. I didn’t venture very far, just let Talo get a taste of the new path, and we got back. Tomorrow we’ll try going a bit further. It was great and I was very proud of him for behaving so well.

Talo and I out in the fields!

Other than that, it’s super hot, so there’s not a lot of turnout time. Talo doesn’t like being out there for too long in the summer, so he spends most of the day in the shade of the stables. The huge fans we have there are doing a great job keeping things bearable.

That’s it for now. I’ll try and update more frequently if I can 🙂