how far we have come

It always happens like this, you work and work for something, at what seems like snails pace. you feel like progress is almost invisible and the destination or goal is so far away, you almost forget about it. It's only when you look back at where you started from, that you realise how far you've come and the progress you've made. Well that's what i have always found with riding, and well life in genral actually.

I know when i was working in a dressage barn learning myself , and trying to train my horse as well. It seemed like i was always at the same level all the time. You were always pushing for that next little step forward in your training, always trying to be better. I would always feel like i was never actually any closer to the end goal. Then one day my mother came to watch, for the first time in about 6 months. She couldn't believe how far id come. she Was stunned at the level my horse and i were now at. It was only then that i realized id come a hell of a long way in a short time. That id improved meteorically.The work i had struggled with 6 months ago, i now sailed through and now what i was working on was miles more advanced. I think that day to day improvements are sometimes so subtle, you take them for granted. You never notice really how far you've come until you look back.

So with the wild horses it is the same. Day to day there is improvement. You realise your making progress. But is only as i sit and write this that i realise how far my two wild ponies and i have come. three weeks ago they were wild, skinny and untouchable. 3 hours ago i was relaxing and leaning against the grey as she grazed down the driveway. I can now pat her all over, legs and head included. She can be lunged (go in a circle for the non-horsey people), she knows all the ground manners and each morning shes waiting at the gate to be caught. Shes even be drenched for worms. funnily enough she didn't mind that, horse feed though still doesn't even register interest.

The bay boy, is the absolute picture of sweetness these days. Like the girl he can be patted all over, he knows all his ground manners and like her has been drenched for worms and also still wont touch horse feed. The boy though seems to have fully embraced domestic bliss. If I'm ever there in the paddock, filling troughs etc, there he is a step behind me watcthing everything. when i let him loose in the morning he follows me down the fence until he hits the end of the paddock. The funniest as well as the sweetest of all, today was watching him investigating the electric fencing unit. Until the inevitable happened and he got a shock, at which stage he came back to me at full speed and stood at my side snorting at the thing that had shocked him. From then on he was stuck to me like glue until i left the paddock.

So really even though progress from day to day is very small steps, overall my two wild ponies have come a long way. I cant actually believe that it was less than a month ago that they arrived and you couldn't get near them. Sometimes you just have to look back to realise how far you've come...I cant wait to be looking back from even further down the track to see how much more we have progressed...