The Fearless Leader turned to all my friends standing beside the show jumping ring and said,

“Walk Away.”

I was coming out of the ring on my fancy new pony,

I had just acquired the ride on the nicest thing I had ever sat on. A true wonder horse that wins the dressage

and had never had a cross country jump penalty.

We had just jumped our first show jumping round (which was clear by the way)

but  apparently it was terrifying enough that the coach sent all the other students scattering while I got a full ring side dressing down.

The summary was, “Don’t break your new toy.”

Essentially he explained that while he understood my excitement to get out and compete my fancy new pony I had no business being at a show with him. I didn’t know him, I had no idea how to ride him and I was going to hurt him if I didn’t take 3 steps back and take a bunch of lessons before our next competition.

Yep. “Don’t break your new toy.”

Message received.

That was 6 years ago.

BadEventer has come a long way since then.

Though I’m no Phillip Dutton, yet, my catch riding abilities have improved significantly since the don’t-break-your-new-toy days.

I was able to get right to it with SpiderWoman. We did one training, one Prelim and then finished 9th out of 47 at our first CIC1*.

So when I obtained my newest Twinkle Toes

I set out a bit of a completely impossible optimistic show plan.

I was calling it our “path to Bromont.”

Someone has to streak the Bromont sign!

But I’m not new to this. I knew when I laid out “the path” it was assuming that all the stars had aligned

and that we were a love-at-first-sight couple

as opposed to a When Harry Met Sally couple.

I laid out my aggressive show schedule which included

one training

one prelim

and then our first CIC1*.

The plan was going well.

But when we arrived at the 1* we passed the jog and while warming up for our dressage lesson she decided that was the moment to develop an abscess.

Talk about timing.

There’s nothing quite like driving 300+ miles to soak feet.

Are first world problems real problems? Is it even permissible to complain about fuel, stall fees, entry fees & hotel rooms, not to compete?

Anyway………………

Missing the relatively soft 1 star due to the sore foot, put me on a path for the next “planned outing” which I’m certain would be a 1 star…….on steroids.

And that’s when this happened.

Does that kind of text strike as much fear in you as it does BadEventer?

It was a familiar talk.

And while this one was delivered……with significantly more tact……than the last time I had this conversation with a fearless leader…….

the summary was the same.

“Things aren’t quite going as planned. Don’t break your new toy.”

And that, is why BadEventer is missing RedHills.