I had a bit of a day at work yesterday, and spent much of the afternoon daydreaming about taking Poe out back, growing a pair, and letting him MOVE. It’s been a bit chilly and windy and he is a bit cooped up, but — what’s the worst that could happen? I let him run a bit and — what? He’ll never, ever, ever stop? He’s definitely not fit enough for that. So I figured I’d put my stirrups up and let us both have a bit of a workout.

When I got to the barn, the instructor who helped me with my bajillion trial saddles on Monday was there. She said Here, I have another one for you to try. She brought two out from a client’s locker. She set the first one on him and we both said HMM. It looked somewhat promising. Not fantastic, and it swam around a little bit, but Hmmmm. She set the next on him — an Albion SLK — and we both said OOOH. It looked really pretty darn good. It has a pretty high cut-back pommel designed for horses with shark-finned withers, which he doesn’t have, but that shouldn’t really matter. We chatted for a while about Albions, how people seem to love them or hate them. Then she left me to ride in it.

So I scrapped my back field plans and took him to the outdoor dressage arena. I swung my leg over and sat in that Albion SLK, and said HMM. And then I asked him to walk, and said OOOH. Wow. My leg just sat nice and sweet as, no knee poking into the thigh block or tree biting at my butt. Maybe this is what everyone keeps talking about, how when you sit in a right one you’ll know. So we went to work.

His Poeness has never seemed to care much about the wind whipping around (though it sure distracts me), but he is a sight-seer — and he always feels stiffer and shorter in that arena to me versus our indoor. I think he just doesn’t like the footing as much? So I struggled for a while to get him to listen to me and soften and stop staring over there and bulging that way and giraffing around please! We had some really nice moments, and worked on some leg yields, and tried to straighten up that right lead canter — and then he just started getting strong and barging around and I took him inside to see if we could get some better quality work. He was still a bit of a pill at times, and running through all my halts and half-halts (ugh, PONY), but we did get some nice work. It’s so impossible to say if he started out choppy and behind the leg because of the saddle, or the footing in the outdoor, or my lack of spurs (I wear them for flatwork but not jumping or galloping), or the day, or..? For the most part I just rode and did not think about the saddle (except to be glad that I didn’t hit that high pommel while posting, or notice that I wasn’t swimming around in it or fighting against it).

Right now it’s tied for #1. I felt like I stuck the canter better in the County, but it’s a poorer fit on him. I’m hoping I can beg another ride or five in the Albion. The instructor said her client doesn’t use it any more, so she’s pretty sure it’s for sale. (Though I did a quick search for them this morning, and am a little disheartened by the prices I’ve found… Though most of what I’ve seen have been Albion SLK something-elses [Ultimas or Brentinas or etc] and I’m pretty sure this one was marked just SLK, so maybe it’s a different model?) Please cross some fingers for me.

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