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For me, my first horse inspired a lot of my current horse characters and taught me more about life than perhaps any other horse I’ve owned. If you don’t have horses, I’m sure you’ve had a pet that had a particular character that just stuck with you.
Whiskey Rose, a.k.a. LL Naseem, was a purebred Arabian mare with three white stockings, a thick white blaze, and a temper to boot. I was twelve. We’d searched for a horse for months after moving onto property and erecting a shaky electric fence. I went away for two weeks with a friend on vacation and came home to find a stack of 9 bales of hay, a saddle on a rack, a shiny bridle, a box of brushes, my family gathered, and a chestnut horse staring back at me. Heaven.
But we were first-time horse owners. What on earth did we know?
This mare and I butted heads a bit. A lot.
- On the trails, if there was a low branch, she’d dive for it. (Though she never did get me completely out of the saddle.)
- At our first horse show, she danced and stomped every single toe among us. (One of my toes is still a bit disfigured.)
- She bullied the rescued thoroughbred we took in and caused him to nearly cut off his hoof. (Thus, he was promptly moved to a new location.)
- She’d never come when you called. (Sometimes it would take an hour to catch her.)
- She refused to get into a horse trailer. (I’ve blocked those memories – I don’t even remember how we even got her in.)
There were countless happy memories with my Whiskey Rose—I showed her in 4H and eventually my little sister did as well. We sold her to a little family and while I feel she was much better trained than when we first got her, I’m sure that spark inside her remained. I’ll always remember her as the spitfire she was, the green rider I started out as, and the wiser girl I became after a short while.
Do you have a horse that influenced you and taught you important life lessons?
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