Today it was, unfortunately, time for a theory lesson. I haven’t been feeling great the last days, so I could have used 45 minutes of horse therapy, but at least I got to be in the stable and say hello to Murphy. Oh, and I did get some good news: there was a cancellation for the jumping lesson during Christmas, so I’m in. That means four lessons in one week between Christmas and New Year, and likely a very sore Linda.
Theory today was a follow-up on the last theory lesson, when we studied herd dynamics. Today, we studied horse-human interactions, with Ricki (one of the ponies) as our guinea pig. He’s semi-high in rank, and can be a bit bossy towards people, so our instructor used him to demonstrate how horses show respect or a lack thereof towards humans. We also discussed the herd dynamics a little bit more, and discussed various horses in the stables in regards to how they interact with people. As usual, I had to ask about Murphy, and the instructor said that as far as she knows, he pretty much lived outdoors all the time until he was six (that’s when he was sold from Ireland to Sweden) and that this is why he gets so uneasy when tied up in a stall. Other than that, he’s a calm, confident and pretty high-ranking horse who has a healthy dose of respect for humans.
Guess I’ll need to sort out better living arrangements for him if I ever manage to buy him. ;)