Git up!

on gentle communication

The stigma isn’t pleasant. Yet, I put up with it. I put up with stigma because of love. No, this isn’t a post about stigma and mental health. This is a post about horses: Specifically, school horses.

‘Schoolies’ as they’re derogatorily referred to are the horses owned by a teaching barn. Generally ridden by beginners, schoolies are steady, frequently sleepy horses that know their job. They can take care of a rider. They also know how to put up with a lot of bullshit.

Beginner riders lack not only knowledge of how to control a horse, but as they learn how, they still lack the fineness that comes with technique and practice . To put it bluntly, it’s rough to be a schoolie. People pull on your face and kick your ribs and ask you uncertainly to do things that you know better than to do.

Non schoolie horses have more gentle ‘buttons’. They require less inputs because they tend to work more in concert with the rider. They need experienced riders not only to have the finesse of subtle inputs, b…