Monday, October 8, 2007


The Hackendale

The day is starting to heat up in the mountains of New Hampshire as a handful of people gather around a beautiful covered round pen strung with small white Christmas lights and watch as a petite woman "leads" a towering, black horse into the arena. He makes a striking picture, glistening black coat, snow white feathers on three legs, white blaze down his face and one light blue eye, human-like in its expressiveness. He's dancing around like a kite at the end of a string as she tells Mark about him. Her husband had "surprised" her with 3 new horses when he came home from a trip. She already had 4 horses of her own, and only room for 4. She only WANTED 4, this was her husband's horse and she hadn't wanted him, he had bitten and kicked her so she was a bit afraid, he was huge so she was a bit intimidated and her husband couldn't even halter him so she was responsible for all the care and training of this horse she didn't want. A lot of emotion there, none of it good, she was very aware of this and had decided to give the horse a chance, 2 months, and came to Mark for help. The lady is a wonderful horsewoman, she obviously had the skill to handle this horse, but felt no connection, the horse was a very accurate mirror of all this stuff emanating from her. He had not been kindly handled at his last home, he is only 5 years old and has never been given a chance to be the horse he is. When the handler said she didn't know why her husband bought him, Mark said because HE could see the horse that was really in there.

She gave the lead rope to Mark, I did not see the next few minutes, but gather that Mark had to give one clear correction and the horse settled down. What I saw when I came back was a totally different horse. He was so relieved and happy to finally meet someone who really got him. He didn't want to be a kite bobbing around the sky, barely connected to anything solid and buffeted around by circumstances beyond his control. He didn't understand what people wanted from him because no one had bothered to explain things to him, just assumed he should know and then punished him for not knowing. When Mark took the lead line in a soft, open palm and sent the message to this lost horse that HE would do no harm, the horse found a soft place to land. I had tears in my eyes watching this horse finally find someone who truly saw him and recognized the good boy, the sensitive, willing, loaded with try soul he possessed. Mark told her all the good things about this horse, what he saw in him, what he felt from him. He joked that if he wasn't honest, he would tell her that this horse was way beyond her being able to fix him, buy him cheap and take him home for his own!

I half-jokingly asked if he was for sale and she said yes, the lady beside me said "He'll be much more expensive on the 4th day though, better get him now!"

After Mark worked WITH the horse a bit and showed the softness and willingness he gave when given the chance, the horsewoman took the lead line again and worked quietly and softly with him and had a different horse. By the second day they really had a good thing going, you could see the horse just wanting to connect with her and her resistance melting away a bit as she admitted he was a good boy and deserved the chance she had given him. I hope they are able to build a relationship that gives them both peace and joy, but at the very least, because this woman was willing to put aside some powerful emotions and open herself up to giving this horse a chance, and because the horse didn't give up on people, he will live a better life and be the horse he truly is with whoever shares his life from now on.

No comments: