Does “the horse does all the work” sound familiar? Here are seven commonly heard questions that make every horse owner and rider cringe.
1. “Horses are a lot of money, don’t you think about all the other things you could spend that money on?”
It’s a chilly January morning and you’re mucking out at 6am. A quick calculation of horse-related costs reveals that in the last 12 months you could have flown to the Bahamas. Twice.
But who would actually choose a life without horses anyway? Never having to warn new acquaintances how we smell, no finding hay in our hair at the office and no more labelling thermometers.
No, we’ll stick thank you — and rather not think about the pounds.
2. “Anyone can ride a horse really. It’s not hard.”
Ah, that old chestnut. Would this overly-confident person like the privilege of having ‘the first ride’ on your newly-backed four-year-old? Thought not.
3. “How does your other half put up with your lifestyle?”
They don’t.
4. “I’d be scared of falling off.”
You prefer not to dwell on riding as being dangerous. Instead you smile politely and say ‘you get used to it’.
5. “Can my daughter/son/niece/step-child/fourth-cousin-once-removed ride your 16hh ex-racer?”
You mean could my horse double up as a schoolmaster so that you don’t have to pay for little Jim to have lessons? Interesting.
6. “I’d love a horse, but I don’t think I could commit”
Sure, there’s an element of rushing home from work to get your horse in from the field, spending weekends building wonky paddocks out of electric fencing and feeding twice a day come rain or shine.
To be honest, if you enjoy regular ‘spare time’, ‘lie ins’ and ‘weekend getaways’ you may not enjoy horsey life. But if you do want to join us, we’ll welcome you to the cause with open arms and ask if you wouldn’t mind getting ours in from the field (occasionally).
7. “Don’t you just sit there while the horse does all the work?”
If we had a pound for every time we’ve heard this one, we could’ve ordered that pair of Le Chameaus twice already! We’d love to see them complete a jump-off without huffing and puffing to the last jump…
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