The wind and the horse

We had a fairly dramatic and frustrating session today. I brought a change of clothes and went straight to the yard from the office to buy myself some time. Max greedily eyed the bagel with homous and coleslaw I'd made for my lunch.

"Gimme!"

I didn't give him any though and told him, "Everything is not for you!"

This did not go over well, though it was amusing to watch him opening his mouth and chewing, while I chewed, intent on getting a bit of what I had.

As we got ready, it started to rain quite hard, but I took him into the indoor school for long lining anyway and figured we'd be OK.

We did ten minutes of warm up, which was fine, and then were just going in to trot work when a flipping gale storm hit us. The heavens opened and rain hit the tin roof of the school like thousands of hammers,and the wind howled.

Felt and sounded like the school was going to come down around our ears!

Max got his freaking out face and stature on. He was on high alert and ready to explode.

I tried to work him through it for a bit, but even I was feeling edgy by the noise and tumult, so called it quits, took everything off him in case to prepare for an explosion.

He had a roll.

I was happy he felt safe enough to roll, but it was very short and he remained electric, really twitchy and stuck close by me with crazy eyes.

I had to grit my teeth to even take him back to his box because he was so coiled and the weather was so freakish.

Took advantage of a little lull in the chaos.Had a word with him:

"OK young sir, I know this is scary, but just stick with me. We'll be OK. Trust."

Got him back and settled in his box and then went back to retrieve his gear from the school.

Half an hour later, no rain, blue sky, but still the crazy wind.

I feel a bit lame for cutting things short, but I weighed it all up and decided I didn't want to put us in that position. Max gets so strong when he's freaked out, and I don't want the indoor school to be a scary place for him, nor do I want him to get an idea of me not being trustworthy or... um "authoritative" isn't the word I want, but I don't want him to sense me helpless because it won't do his confidence any good. So I think I handled the situation in the best way I could.

Feels like a bit of a cop-out frankly, but I will push those thoughts out of my head. Another horse, maybe I could have pushed through. but Max, no. I know he's a lovely, kind boy, but the feeling of him when he gets like that is a bit sobering. He's powerful beyond any strength I have, so I have to rely on my wits to keep him focused and calm because my puny arms sure as heck won't do the trick to hold him and keep him out of danger if he gets away from me and into mischief with anxiety.

Makes me think of my dad when I was a kid spinning out with panic.

"Deep breath in! Hold it and THINK!"

I'm not scared of Max, but I know I haven't the skill (yet?) to work through it when the red mist descends over sense.

Yeah, of course it makes me feel crap, but I do know my limitations and I don't want issues forming with the school being a bad place, so I did what I did. Judgment call in the moment.