Bonding...

A Boy and His Mare

Confession: I am an only child.  Perhaps you've heard the rumors that sometimes only children have difficulty sharing?  We are capable of learning but, yes, sharing can be a challenge.  There's a famous story in my family about my grandparents, some M&Ms, and a childhood friend.  Goes like this: Nana and Pop Pop came to visit and as they always did, they brought a bag of M&Ms. 

I was playing with a girlfriend at the time, and after the hugs were over and the candy was in my sweaty little palms, I started stuffing my piehole with the M&Ms.  Needless to say, I was not sharing with my girlfriend, and my grandparents chastised me for this.  As the story goes, I turned to Vanna Kay, handed her ONE blue M&M, and announced, "I'm SHARING!"

Time, marriage and motherhood have improved my ability to share -- somewhat.  Case in point, I share my mare with my son.  And tonight I shared my "solo" barn time AND my mare with my son.  To explain, normally Tuesday nights are "my" night at the barn (aka Mom Therapy) and the Hub and the Boy take Sophie to soccer.  However, tonight the Boy wanted to come to the barn and ride.  So off we went.

We had a nice chat on the way down.  We practiced loon calls.  We discussed the migratory pattern of loons and music from the 1980s (not that one has anything to do with the other).  The chat continued while we groomed and fussed over Sugar.  Noah hopped on her first and warmed her up, and when they began to trot I found myself striding around the arena offering pointers and sharing some insights from from a video I'd just seen on EquestrianCoach.com. My ideas seemed to help, the boy felt improvement in his balance, and I felt good for being able to help.  Yay all around.

A Mare and Her Boy

After I rode her for a little bit we let her loose in the indoor to have a roll and play a bit.  Noah and I ran around trying to get her to play tag with us (only possible if we ran while crinkling peppermint wrappers) and after she rolled he groomed her and told her about his day while I cleaned tack.  We blanketed her, kissed her goodnight, made our rounds kissing everyone else goodnight, and headed home.

I started the evening looking forward to some alone time with my mare.  I spent the evening thoroughly enjoying time with my son and our horse.  I guess this sharing thing ain't all that bad.  Who knew?

Just in case you were wondering, I stiill don't share chocolate.  Ever.  Some things don't change.