The Equines in our Lives

[Nanno]

Hehe... we have one of those big balls down at Saddle Club so we can play soccer. My horses love it. But it took Skokie a while to warm up to the ball and for good reason. For one thing, he's so tall that he's the only horse it can roll under without touching his belly, and it kind of startles him when it does. For another thing, when he was a yearling (same day I snapped that photo of the two horses running in the white-railed pasture matter-of-fact!), I gave Skokie and Jet a ball to play with. It was not as big as the soccer ball, but was still advertised as being for horses. Well, apparently it was not quite as sturdy as advertised. Skokie was playing with it in the round pen and kicked it ahead of him as he was galloping. He overran it and tried to jump it while it was still going pretty fast. He cleared it with the front but it rolled under his hocks as they tried to clear it. There was a "Whoosh!" as his hind legs went out from under him and he sat down hard right on top of the ball! The thing went "POW!" and Skokie was dumped on his backside. I've never seen a horse leap up so fast and run. He was terrified from the unexpected noise and I could tell he was unnerved by the fact that the ball had absolutely vanished. He couldn't connect a big, bouncing purple ball with the flat, lifeless pancake it had become, and he would not stop searching for it. It took him a long time to get used to the soccer ball at the Saddle Club when I introduced him to it a few years later. He didn't mind chasing it, but if it ever came toward him he headed for the hills!