Penny is the only horse I never suspected would inspire gratitude. Yet she, perhaps more than any other horse, has earned it. For her sky-high expectations. For her challenges to complacency. Most importantly, for her recent reminder that no single ride defines me.
Last Saturday, she and I had our best-ever ride. A crisp October breeze lifted her mane as we cantered an infinity loop. Ringed by trees flashing citron and ginger, the arena called to mind a hoop of fire we pierced with every jump. She gifted me with flying lead changes over poles—a first. Braided leather reins winding between my fingers telegraphed messages from her brain to mine with a clarity I hadn’t previously experienced. A substitute instructor’s suggestion that I adjust my position adhered my seat and legs to Penny’s torso. I felt her muscles reach and relax, reach and relax. We stretched and flexed in sync: an accordion and the air that flowed through it. We glided. No, we floated.
The following day, Penny and I had our worst-ever ride. She protested my every request to canter. She cut out ahead of fences, juking like an NFL halfback and leaving me, like the opponent’s safety, baffled and off-balance. When she refused fences, I folded at the waist like a fan, whiplash snaking through my spine. Riders less than half my age watched me fail to clear fences they had sailed over seconds before. Humiliation seeped from my pores. I struggled to hold back tears frustration shoved against my lower lids, to breathe evenly as anger drew a cord around my throat.
I backed out of the lot post-lesson convinced I was the least competent rider ever allowed on a horse. I’d never get it right. Four years and thousands of dollars wasted. I considered quitting.
But I didn’t.
The following week, my regular instructor suggested subtle fixes for my lower leg. I took them to heart. My ride improved—a little.
Intuition hinted that taut hamstrings and compressed calves I’d earned by replacing yoga with four-mile jogs prevented me from stretching through my heels when Penny leapt. I set aside time each day to stretch, pretending I slid mozzarella muscles into the cavern of my oven’s maw and imaging they lengthened like pizza toppings I anchored with my teeth as I drew the crust from my lips.
Penny and I traced infinity loops again that next weekend, hurdling fences at each teardrop’s rounded edge. She listed right ahead of one but failed to catch me by surprise. I pulled her up, straightened her out, pushed her over—a Frankenstein jump. The day’s ride rated neither best nor worst.
Gravel popping beneath my truck’s tires on the way out reminded me of my favorite buttery snack, an apt image for jumping fences with Penny. I never knew until she leapt whether we’d change from hard kernel agitated by building pressure into an airy treat. My best bet was planning for the worst and accepting grace when granted by the gods.
Popcorn also struck me an appropriate metaphor for learning, which is always a series of ups and downs, fits and starts, pressure and release—something my career showed me every day if I paid attention. Some mornings I gathered syllabi and attendance sheets, flicked off fluorescent lights, and locked classroom doors with a sigh of dejection, interpreting students’ hooded eyes as boredom and dubbing myself a failure as a teacher. Other days, I emerged jubilant, carried by student engagement after I called an audible on my planned lesson. Those days, I shone, certain of my teaching talent.
Most class periods, however, like most rides, fell somewhere in between.
Riding, teaching, and in fact, life, Penny reminds me, are a compilation of takeoffs and landings, but mostly progress across the flat sand between fences. Each experience—good, bad, neither—offers lessons I can choose to accept, but no single one defines me as a rider, teacher, or human being.
And for that, I am grateful.