Return to Riding: OURC Cuppers 2014

I haven't ridden a horse since the beginning of this past January, when I got to spend winter break with my mare Scarlett. In the last few months, since the car accident in France, I haven't been doing all that much physically, and I've been missing riding and horses more terribly than I can say. It's been a part of me for so long that I don't feel entirely like myself when horses are not a regular aspect of my life. Today, though, I finally made it back into the saddle -- after my longest riding hiatus since I started riding seriously at age 12!

The occasion was the annual "cuppers" for the Oxford Riding Club, a fun day of friendly college versus college competition, for which I represented my own college, St. John's. The format was very similar to the collegiate riding I did at Stanford, at least in IDA (dressage) mode: draw an unfamiliar horse, have a few minutes to warm up, then perform a dressage test before a judge. I wasn't in a competitive mindset at all -- I was just thrilled to be back on a horse, to feel that familiar movement beneath me, so much so that I kept feeling recurring surges of strong emotion. As much as I love Oxford otherwise, this -- this -- has been absent. The horse I drew was a bit tricky to balance and get round, but we figured each other out well enough to go into the ring and put down the best ride of the day, thus securing the win for St. John's (and some champion individual rider honors for myself). Not bad for not riding for almost five months!

I got to meet some interesting new horsey people today, and at the end of the day a few members of Oxford's varsity team asked me to consider trying out next fall. I think I might do just that. Honestly, days full of horses and like-minded horsey people are so needed here and there. Already can't wait to ride again, and am so happy and so thankful I'm once again physically capable of doing so.