The Risks of Getting an New Horse

Choosing a new horse, whether you buy him or he is given to you, is a very risky endeavor. All the riskier when you are like us, and plan to get a horse for keeps. Ellen and I are just not the kind of people who can pass our animals on to an unknown future. It doesn’t take very long, and we are so attached to our animals that we can’t let them go down an uncertain path. So, when we choose, we choose carefully.

Who am I kidding. We were all fairly certain Ellen would buy Dante when she went down to West Virginia. I was far from sure that Cole was the right horse for me when I visited him—but I was feeling so out of sorts after losing Mingo, I bought him anyway. Cruiser was love at first sight—but seriously, they called him Satan—I bought a horse named Satan! The fact that it was less than 2 weeks after Brandy died probably influenced my decision, too, don’t you think? With Kevin and Starry, it was love at first sight, too. Ellen looked at few horses before choosing Ranger—and the main reason for saying “yes” was that they said he could cross water. Mingo, I had from birth, so there was no choosing there.

Now, should I choose this horse? He sounded so good, but we had a problem—distance. He lives in Canada—and not the just-across-Lake Erie Canada. (I live at the border—Cleveland.) He is in Manitoba. I didn’t even know where that was on the map! I would be getting a horse, sight unseen. But then, if we would have gotten Cruiser, Ranger, Starry, Cole or Dante sight unseen, it wouldn’t have made any difference.

With Cruiser and Cole, I couldn’t even take them for a test ride, as they had never been ridden.

Sometimes, you just have to follow your guts. If things seem right, they might just be right.

The owner of the horse sent me a lengthy reply to my email. So far, everything sounded hopeful. At the end of it, she gave me her phone number and encouraged me to call.

I thought it might just be time for a conversation.

I was no longer thinking of my upcoming medical test. Now, I was being kept up at night by the lure of a Canadian horse.