[drivingpairs] Insensitive,spoiled jerks! // was: Re: who's driving
- From: "Laura Crews" <barnrats@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: drivingpairs@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 17 Mar 2003 00:12:16 -0500
Gail,
What a horror story! What a shame you endured such abuse and condescension!
I'll echo what some others have been saying: Come stay at my place in
Virginia and let's have some fun! Heck, it would probably be worth it to me
to buy you a plane ticket (I don't think I'm really joking, either!)!!
I have seen the snobbery you describe. The limited combined driving
competing I've experienced has put me alongside some of the ultra-wealthy.
I have felt some condescension but it has never really expressed itself. I
am owner, trainer, groom, and competitor all rolled into one. I have
learned that the "informal" competitors parties with "come as you are"
attire has a different meaning to a millionaire (which I'm not!). (Hint: it
does NOT mean show up in CLEAN barn clothes.) I find it more enjoyable to
stay quiet and eavesdrop on interesting conversations of the very rich!
Still, in general, the driving people I've met are nothing like the
cut-throat competitors I've seen in the hunter world! There are indeed many
very conjovial driving people who are owner, trainer, competitor and groom.
I resort to taking out ads in newspapers for free riding lessons in exchange
for help at shows. It is very difficult to find ANYONE willing. They find
out that I have "just ponies" and they "don't want to do... THAT!" They
want to ride some Quarter Horses in the local little pseudo-shows. I just
have "ponies" and no one wants to mess with THEM... even if we are going to
national-level recognized shows... it's very frustrating. My best students
right now are aged 8 and 10. Adorable little girls that can ride my small
ponies. But they can't help much (yet!) with the driving.
What I'm faced with right now is kicking two 14-year-olds out of my program.
I hate to have to do it, but when they lit up a cigarette the other day,
THAT WAS IT!! They showed up unexpectedly just after several of us had
returned from driving on the roads and we unhitched. I was on an early
schedule because I had to get up at 0300 for day shift on the police desk
the next morning (yes dear, I actually have to work for a living!). I was
surprised to see them, since one's mom had previously told me she couldn't
come that day because she was babysitting. The other girl comes only to
"keep up with" her friend.
Instead of helping with the ponies or putting anything away, or even rolling
the carriage out of the crosstie area to the end of the barn, they whispered
secretly to themselves, snickered, and then ignored my requests. The next
thing I knew, they had walked out the end of the barn and were smoking.
Thank god they exited the barn.
I called out to put the cigarette out NOW. They looked up and let me know
they heard me, and made it plain they didn't take me seriously. They
eventually came back in the barn to call for a ride home again.
I am certain that if I had not been home, they would have shown up and maybe
even smoked in the barn. They came one Saturday when I was at work and
tacked up a couple of ponies and rode them in the turnout paddock. I had
until then made them ride in the indoor track, because they were not ready
to take the ponies out and rip around. I told them I have some of the
fastest ponies in three states. Apparently they wanted to see if that was
true, and took them out and raced them. One girl fell off (she kept saying
the pony THREW her). I got home after the fact. I was NOT happy. Their
parents had no idea that I was not even home that day. Since then, the one
girl has been terrified riding. She has jumped off a pony at a walk,
screaming and literally diving head first to the ground, saying the pony was
"throwing" her. She has never ridden on the marathon carriage. I feel
certain she would be terrified and would jump off as we went down the road.
Better to "fire" her from helping at all at this point, I guess.
What I'm trying to say (I think) is that finding suitable help is so very
very difficult, especially when I am not rich enough to hire full time a
graduate of an equine studies program to come live in my barn and to let me
be the "absent" owner. And another thing: I cannot take a
riding-experienced horse person and expect them to have the "common sense"
you'd think they'd have around horses. Handling driving horses is very very
different from handling riding horses. People develop unconscious habits
that are very difficult to break. Some things just CANNOT be done around
driving horses (like, for example, leaning forward in the cart and smacking
one's hand down hard on the pony's butt to "swat a fly"). My ponies do not
respond to "kisses" or "clucks." You would be amazed at how many people
make such sounds every few seconds. I find it annoying. My ponies ignore
the sounds. I have to scold people when they cheerfully assure me that the
pony is "starting to learn it though!"
Yes, you are welcome to come stay with me anytime!
Laura Crews
Country Roads Farm Welsh Ponies*
Virginia
*and Fancy Rats
"My furs are not in storage or draped across the bed,
They're hanging from the cage door, waiting to be fed."
"Horses very rarely display the extreme strength that they are blessed with.
It is truly awesome when you see it. You want it pointed in the right
direction."
Anyone who would release an animal into the wild to fend for itself should
themselves be put out in the wilderness with no food or water. If they
survive, then they know how the animal feels. If they don't survive, then
they have improved the human gene pool....
Remember: STUPIDITY IS A SEXUALLY TRANSMITTED DISEASE!
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