goddessfarmer | tiring wonderful tiring day

I'm in VT, with unexpected net tonight. Today started with me in a cheap motel in Ascutney VT and Skippy at Sue Berril's Greylock Farm not far away in Brownsville, VT. Early this morning, I had a dressage lesson with Sue. The theme of that lesson was convincing Skippy that he should use his right hind leg more. I need to not be satisfied with what we have, but ask for more. And lo, when the right hind is actually working, he becomes straight and through his back. Yay. But man, that was work. I got cleaned up after that, loaded Skip on the trailer and drove over to Denny Emerson's Tamarack Hill Farm. Normally, when one signs up for a lesson with Denny, it is assumed to be a group lesson. He just doesn't have enough hours in the day for everyone. I got a rare treat today in the form of a private lesson. It's been a couple of years since I last has instruction from Denny, so I filled him in on where we're going and where we have recently been. He set up a stadium course that tested my nerves (mostly) and my ability in the face of that to keep my damn leg on and go forward to the jumps. In summary, all of my problems are in my head. Every jump we jumped my position was ace. The ones we didn't jump (on the first try) were because I circled out of fear of it not being right. I need to "just go." Skip was awesome of course. Denny said at the end that he wished we had video of my riding so he could show me how good I was. This is his way of building my confidence, but I don't think he'd say it if it weren't true. So now I'm tired, er, exhausted. I'll probably be fast asleep by 9pm. I have another Denny lesson/cross country school in the morning, then I head home. And oh by they way, it's not any cooler up here.