There’s nothing quite like a viewing of the Black Stallion or settling in a comfy chair on a rainy afternoon and delving into the likes of the Silver Brumby or the classic Black Beauty. And really, this is where the passion for horses starts for many.

It’s been a very interesting week working at one of the riding schools and ending up with new instructors and therefore learning even more while in the saddle. This has been topped off by a weekend of teaching today and a gymkhana tomorrow and Monday I’m going to another Thoroughbred Sale. And in less than four weeks time, South Africa! Guess I can’t complain about things being boring 😉

I had some friends over last night and yesterday morning in anticipation of wanting to eat lots of junk, I drove down to the local IGA store to stock up on the essentials – chocolate, icecream and Pringles. Where could you go wrong? My mistake – parking right in front of the Opp Shop next door to the IGA.

Now I keep telling myself that I won’t purchase any more horse books until I’ve read all the ones I’ve got (still got 15 of those to read. Well, now it’s 17).

It’s a bit hard not to notice when you look up from parking the car and staring at you out of the shop window is the front cover of a book that definitely has a horse on it. Now horse books are enough to have my attention, but extremely cheap horse books? I’m doomed.

So of course I wandered in and go figure, the book I’d seen wasn’t actually about horses, just had one on the front. But this led me to spotting A Horse Called Butterfly by Thurley Fowler. The front cover of a girl sitting in a tree looking completely unimpressed with a Palomino beside her jogged a memory of reading the book around fifteen years ago in primary school – scary!

So, I just had to add it to my collection and another – Pony Jobs for Jill by Ruby Ferguson that was on the same shelf. Addicted? Indeed.

I was telling a client about this at one of the riding schools that I was at earlier in the week and she commented how it was the movie National Velvet that actually convinced her to follow up on a childhood dream. Now with a child of her own who is old enough to be riding, she has finally acted on the desire to ride that was long ago ignited probably due to a similar movie or favourite horse book. It’s the likes of these classics that keep instructors and stable hands in work, I do believe.

Love reading horse related pieces yourself? Take a look at ridersnreapers.com – two pieces: Shivers and Taken Care Of. There’ll be another up there titled In the Midst of Adversity when the next edition comes out; a third horse piece I’ve written.
Got a rather large collection of horse books yourself? See if it compares to mine and tell me what I’m missing!

“There are only two emotions that belong in the saddle; one is a sense of humour and the other is patience.” – John Lyons

tag: horse library, instructing, writing