My Other Half (OH)

I suppose I should tell you about my other half. I'll call him my OH. We have been together almost 15 yrs now. We use to live in the city until 8 yrs ago when he bought a house on property. He always has lived in the city, unlike me, who was raised in the country. He always knew that I wanted horses again someday. We had ridden horses together at a family get together and we also went on a guided trail ride, he loved it. So when I was given the opportunity to get back into horses again 5 yrs ago and I went to him to ask him if I could take this horse that someone wanted to give to me, he said yes! We did not have any fencing and what did my OH do? He went out that week and bought all the fencing material and had it up within a week so my new horse could come home as soon as possible.

He watched me ride and train my new horse Brandy for a couple years. One day while we were out feeding he said he wanted to get a horse, my jaw dropped, I said you want to get a horse? He said well it will really be your horse, I just want to be able to ride it whenever I want! Ok than. The next couple months we kind of looked around. We went to an auction, he saw one he liked but we were not ready to just jump into it so quick. A month later we went to another auction. Now this goes against my better judgement, I have always said I would never buy a horse from an auction but we ended up falling in love with this beautiful black and white Paint mare. After a very stressful bidding war we won the bid on the Paint mare. This is how Fritzy came into our lives. I will tell more about that day at another time.

My OH became a part of Fritzy's training. He also took some lessons from my trainer, but he decided he did not like riding in the arena. He actually hated it. Riding around in circles, as he calls it, did not excite him. What he wanted to do was get out on the trail. After alot of trail training with Fritzy and my trainer, my OH finally got to go on his first trail ride on "his" horse. This is exactly where he wanted to be. I was totally fine with that, even though I was going to be taking over all the arena work of Fritzy!

My OH can go out to the pasture and halter the horses. He will brush them but he doesn't get the same enjoyment we girls get when we go out to brush our horses. When we get to the trailhead he will put the saddle on their backs for me, which is a great help since my trail saddle weighs about 35 lbs! He does not know how to cinch the saddle nor does he know how to bridle. I have had him watch me do it and he watches me but doesn't seem too interested in learning to do it. I have told him I really want him to learn how to do this. My goal this year is to teach him how to cinch up his saddle and bridle his horse. It would make things easier for me when we hit the trails.

Just watching him ride on the trails brings a smile to my face. He'll just be sitting there with a smile on his face, looking around at the scenery. I think he is in horse heaven when he is out in the wilderness on the back of a horse!

My OH feeds the horses and all the animals every morning. I know he gets up about 1/2 an hour earlier for work to do this. He knows I am not a morning person. Rain or shine, dark or light, through 2 feet of snow, he heads out to the pastures every morning. Even on his days off. He never complains. He knows when he feeds at night when I am not here to check the horses for anything that could be wrong, like cuts, acting strange, etc. He even has taken a blanket off a time or 2.

He rounds up goats, with a little bit of help from those crazy Aussies.

He'll even scoop poop out of the barn, the barn he built, and put down fresh shavings. He's learned how to drive the truck and horse trailer and back the trailer up which we all know is not easy! He's even washed my horse trailer for me when I am at work, although I did ask him to do this, he did not complain! He did find out it is hard work washing the trailer! He taught me how to hook up the horse trailer, something I had never done before.

He loves to feed treats to the horses and goats, I do have to get after him from time to time for hand feeding treats to the horses!

He even helped me cut down trees, level an area of our property, spent hours on a bulldozer, helped pay for 10 dumptruck loads of fill dirt, just so I could have an arena. I told him for years I really needed an arena, where I was working my horses was an unfenced, level piece of property by my neighbors house that wasn't quite working for 2 green horses. I don't think he realized how much work it was going to be putting an arena in, or me for that matter! He even paid for half the arena fencing, even though he would never ride in the arena. But he knew I needed a safe place to continue training my horses. He also put in a picnic table by the arena so he can come sit, drink beer and watch me and my sis ride our horses.

I am very lucky that he does all this for me and that he doesn't complain, much. He would tell you that he does all the hard work around here and doesn't get to have any fun, that is not true. He is more than welcome to join me for a ride in the arena, this is his choice. But like I said, I am ok with that. I am just happy that he decided to take a part in the horse world with me!