Welcome back peeps!! Today I’ve decided to do a little story time of one of my more embarrassing moments from many years ago. I’ve been lucky to spend many years grooming for my coach as well as being one of her students. Predominantly a dressage rider (you can look up her list of accomplishments here if you feel so inclined https://daisymeadowsequestrian.com/about/) I started with her when I was barely 14, going to some large international shows including this particular international CDI in the spring of 2011.
I have to say looking back now, it’s a wonder that my coach trusted my greener than grass ass to come along for these. Some of my favourite early memories of horse showing are all from large dressage shows. In those days, we’d set up the evening before and she would pick me up from my house at 3am and we’d drive in complete silence for the almost 2 hour drive it would take us to get to the show grounds. In case you couldn’t gather, neither of us are really morning people and so it was really just both of us sipping our coffee and wondering what on earth possessed us to be a part of a sport that required us to be up so damn early. Once we got there it was always all hands on deck to give Petey, her Prix St. George horse at the time a bath, braided and ready for their classes that day.
I learned how to prep the stalls at a show, organize a tack room, braid, remove stains from a particularly disgusting grey horse (poop for a pillow? Of course! Manage to give himself a massive belly stain before an 8am class despite being bubble wrapped? Absolutely!), developed a very particular equation for what I liked in my ringside grooming kit, tricks for cleaning dressage tack and dress boots, and how to see six steps ahead for what needed to be done for my horse and rider. It was a pivotal time in my life as a young equestrian, and I am so grateful for all the things I learned during that time. However, there are some lessons that are a little harder won than others, and this would be one of them.
Of course it was an 8am class, and the air was already thick with humidity that would hang around for another long show day. It was so hot in fact, that when I sent Daisy off to the warm up ring with her trainers, Neil and Cindy Ishoy, she left in just her show shirt. Never far behind, I liked to make sure I could double check my ringside kit to ensure I had all the things I needed, some things more important than others. This included a test book, water, sunscreen, rags to wipe down rider boots, mints for the horse, and in this case… Daisy’s show jacket. Another important element to this story is the distance between the rings and the stabling. On foot, it would easily be about a ten minute walk for me to get to the ring, especially from where we were stabled.
So there I am, rolling in to the warm up ring to watch Daisy put Petey through his paces under the ever watchful eyes of both Neil and Cindy. What was a rigorous workout for those two was what would have been my first break of the day, watching them both warm up and keeping an eye on the clock. As the minutes counted down until it was time to go in, I would hop over the fence and do a final once over of my team. I would have Petey’s boots pulled, Daisy’s boots wiped down, and tack given a final wipe before sending them to the ring. This would also normally be the time that I would hand off the show jacket, but alas, not on this day. We walked over to just outside the show ring where we would wait until the final salute before Daisy would head in.
With 2 riders out, it was at this moment standing around in the waiting area that Cindy would look to Daisy and say, “Alright, let’s get your jacket on.” At which point all eyes would look to me expectantly, for a show jacket I should have been carrying with me since leaving the stables.
If you’ve ever experienced the unique sensation of your stomach dropping right out of your body, you’d be feeling a fraction of what I was feeling in that moment. There are not words to adequately describe the sheer panic that then washed over me as three pairs of eyes waited for me to produce the now very important show jacket. If there was a hole next to me, I’d of jumped in it to die rather than deal with the rather large mistake I had just made. For context, you can be disqualified for entering a show ring if jackets had not been excused at dressage shows, especially at this high a level. So months of training, hours of scrubbing, lunging, bathing, braiding, and not to mention a fair amount of money all came down this jacket that was now, very far away from me.
I think Neil might have laughed, Cindy looked like she was about to keel over, and Daisy simply looked at me, and more serious than I had ever heard her she said, “Well I guess you’d better run.” Which sounds just as dramatic as it felt and I turned on my heel and took off towards the barn. The world was a blur, horses and people alike glared at me as I RAN as fast as my disproportionately short legs could carry me through very deep sand footing and over hills. Which was just rude at that point. After finally arriving at our stabling I literally skidded around the corner and blast into our tack room, and without much as a glance picked up every jacket bag that was hung up and bolted back out the door.
Now to add insult to injury, there just so happened to be a bike leaning against the end of the stabling that I knew belonged to one of the other grooms that had come for this show. In an effort to get back faster, I in the moment thought, that it would be wise to attempt to bike back through deep sand and over hills. It is also worth mentioning that the owner of said bike is about a head taller than me with perfect long ass dressage legs. Go figure.
I realized very quickly that this was a bad idea when I went to try and pedal away without being able to touch the ground. I made it maybe 10 feet before hitting a particularly deep patch, getting stuck and actually falling over. I couldn’t even tell you the slew of curse words that I had in my head in that instant, but it was pretty colourful. So now, I had to get up, roll the bike back and continue on my SPRINT back to the ring. Cue more glares from riders, trainers, and horses alike as I zipped by.
Finally racing into view, I don’t think I was able to make a coherent sound as I passed the jacket to Cindy like a very shameful relay runner who then with LITERAL seconds to spare was able to help get it on Daisy and send her into the ring. My lungs were burning, my face was red from a mix of extreme exertion and deep embarrassment, and the sand looked like a very good place to lay down in to recover from my Olympic level sprint to save the day from my self-inflicted disaster. I couldn’t tell you how the test, the rest of the day, or the rest of the weekend went, but I can tell you that I have that exact moment of "Oh shit" branded into my memory forever.
That day was a real trial by fire, but I’ll tell you something- I have never in the 8 years since forgotten, or had any of my riders forget a jacket. I have been to many shows since, and will go to many shows I’m sure in the future, but I will never, ever do that again. Anywho, there’s my embarrassing story about a time I messed up big. Have a beautiful day, and remember to bring your jacket to the ring!!
Xo,
Sara
Omg I died laughing at this!! Great story and well written.