It's past time to end the "pony envy"

[magical thyme]

120. I did NOT muck out the stables of the 1%. That is my point.

When I rode the 1%ers donated horses -- they were *donated.* I paid the teacher the same for the lessons as if I'd had my own horse. The use of the highly trained, Grand Prix horses was free. This was true also for my best friend at the time. The other 2 students we often had lessons with were wealthy and did have their own horses to ride. We paid the same amount of money for our lessons as they did. The 1%er did those things out of passion for dressage and the wish to foster its growth.

But that was then, and this is now. The 1%ers have changed; instead of fostering aspiring young riders and humane horse care and training, the Romneys and their ilk have bought their way into the Olympics and forced everybody else onto the sidelines. There was a time when the lead Olympic dressage team rider was on a rescued, off the track thoroughbred that she trained herself. Those days are long gone, thanks to people like the Romneys. That they were involved in drugging an unsound horse and selling him for $125K only adds to my contempt for them. It highlights how they treat people: "fond" of them as long as they can get something, use them up and then throw them to the wolves. I despise them as much as anybody else here, if only because they crapped on my sport.

My friends and I mucked out the stables and cleaned tack small, working class horse business owners. They were trainers/riders with barns -- often leased barns-- and a small herd of lesson horses.

If you had money you could buy lessons on their horses. If you didn't have money, you could work to ride their horses in lessons and to go trail riding or whatever. Every small barn back then was based, in part, on some students working off part or all of their lessons. Or you could work off some or all of the board for your own horse. Or half-lease one of their lesson horses to ride on your own some days and have lessons on others.

Horses are a huge amount of work to maintain and trainers were run ragged trying to take care of all the horses and teach and find time to ride themselves. So they were always open to the "working student" concept. And for aspiring horsepeople, the best way to learn horse care taking is to do it as a student, under the watchful eye of a pro, so you learn correct care, what is correct feed, what is inappropriate, what can kill your horse, as well as learn how to treat every day injuries.