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Jackson again
Feb. 21st, 2009 11:09 pmI've decided I definitely want to sell Jackson, I just don't see us working out in the long run. While I thought I wanted a "challenging" horse to ride, I definitely don't want a horse that's nothing BUT a challenge to ride! I can't see him ever really mellowing out to be the chill, hack-around horse I now realize I actually want (not for many years at any rate), and I simply can't justify throwing all my money away and not having any fun in the meantime while waiting for that to possibly maybe happen. Of course this is a terrible time to sell horses, and I'm not sure who would really want a huge, cranky 15 year old sort-of jumper/sort-of dressage horse. If worse comes to worse I may end up giving him to someone's jumping lesson program. Other options could be getting a month or two or training for him, or trying to put him at a sale barn, but those would be really expensive and not something I can really afford to do.
For the time being one of my instructor's other students (Kelly) has been riding him a lot, three or four times a week for me. She's currently between horses and looking for her next eventer, and she's riding Jackson in both dressage and jumping lessons. He definitely does not like dressage, but he does seem to enjoy jumping. She's all for continuing to ride him even when she does get another horse, and my hope is that him basically getting all this free "training" will make him more attractive for someone to buy down the road. I'm just hoping it's not TOO long down the road; I can't wait forever because I really need to move him to a cheaper barn. However, when I do that I will no longer have Kelly to ride him, and he won't be getting any better with me on him. I've decided I'll leave him where he is for about two more months, but after that I'll have to make that move.
Furthermore, once I do find Jackson another home, I'm going to hold off getting another horse for a while. Instead I'm going to take more riding lessons and possibly lease a horse in order to get a better idea of where I really want to go with my horse hobby, as well as work towards becoming a better rider. I'm also considering going back to school (and studying something that would actually be USEFUL for getting a real career; kids, don't major in liberal arts!), and not owning a horse would free up a lot more time for me to do so.
Anyway, the point of this post was to share some video clips of Jackson being jumped the other day. His previous owner said she did a lot of showing with him in jumping, although I have no idea at what level or for how long or even if he was ever taught how to jump in the first place. ( So he's now getting refresher work with Kelly. )
For the time being one of my instructor's other students (Kelly) has been riding him a lot, three or four times a week for me. She's currently between horses and looking for her next eventer, and she's riding Jackson in both dressage and jumping lessons. He definitely does not like dressage, but he does seem to enjoy jumping. She's all for continuing to ride him even when she does get another horse, and my hope is that him basically getting all this free "training" will make him more attractive for someone to buy down the road. I'm just hoping it's not TOO long down the road; I can't wait forever because I really need to move him to a cheaper barn. However, when I do that I will no longer have Kelly to ride him, and he won't be getting any better with me on him. I've decided I'll leave him where he is for about two more months, but after that I'll have to make that move.
Furthermore, once I do find Jackson another home, I'm going to hold off getting another horse for a while. Instead I'm going to take more riding lessons and possibly lease a horse in order to get a better idea of where I really want to go with my horse hobby, as well as work towards becoming a better rider. I'm also considering going back to school (and studying something that would actually be USEFUL for getting a real career; kids, don't major in liberal arts!), and not owning a horse would free up a lot more time for me to do so.
Anyway, the point of this post was to share some video clips of Jackson being jumped the other day. His previous owner said she did a lot of showing with him in jumping, although I have no idea at what level or for how long or even if he was ever taught how to jump in the first place. ( So he's now getting refresher work with Kelly. )
