Category: philosophizing

philosophizing · Uncategorized

Equestrian Circles of Hell

Amanda13 Comments

Dante Alighieri famously imagined Hell for his epic poem Divine Comedy. In the section labeled “Inferno,” he and the classical poet Virgil travel downward through nine circles, each one worse than the last. The idea is that the lower you go, and the higher the number of the circle, the worse the sins you’ve committed. (So for example, the first circle is full of “virtuous pagans,” who get off relatively lightly; the ninth circle has traitors.)

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So, how would Dante classify equestrian sins in his circles?

Here are some ideas.

1st Circle: Unknowing Transgressions

  • sharing the 52 Thoroughbreds meme every time you see it on your Facebook wall
  • yelling at owners for blindfolding their horses when you see fly masks
  • asking if your child/boyfriend/dog can ride your friend’s horse

2nd Circle: Little White Lies

  • pretending you rescued a horse that you actually just bought out of someone’s backyard
  • bending the truth a little bit about the height you jump when you’re in a new group of horse friends
  • writing a sales ad that says your horse is half a hand taller than he actually is

3rd Circle: Fashion Faux Pas

  • sneering at eventers for flaunting their colors XC
  • dropping fashion brand names into casual conversation just to prove you know what’s up
  • criticizing someone else’s horsekeeping over trivial superficial things like mane maintenance (roached, pulled, long) or clipping
  • looking down on people who love color and bling in their riding gear
  • looking down on people who buy all their riding gear in black

4th Circle: Showing

  • not being on deck & ready when your name is called
  • any kind of abuse of any kind of show official or volunteer
  • bringing a stallion for stabling without notifying show management

5th Circle: Barn Transgressions

  • leaving your halter still hooked to the crossties
  • leaving manure in the aisle or the ring
  • not leaving the ring just as you found it ie leaving poles down OR tampering with jumps as they’ve been set up
  • not removing hair from the wash stall drain
  • not putting the broom or manure fork back

6th Circle: The Internets

  • participating in indiscriminate public shaming by ad hominem attack instead of legitimate, thoughtful dialogue, whether via forum or Facebook
  • bros who tell you that it’s not really a sport
  • that one aunt who keeps asking when you’ll give up horses and start having babies
  • most forums

7th Circle: Un-Professionals

  • clinicians who do nothing but shit all over riders in front of them in the guise of sounding smart and tough
  • barn workers who ignore special instructions that have been discussed and agreed upon
  • cranky old men & woman whose entire schtick is bitching about kids these days and how they’ll never be true horsemen
  • riders who only show up to take the reins at a show
  • anyone who is needlessly rude to barn workers, vet techs, working students, anyone in a relatively lower position of power

8th Circle: Money, Money, Money

  • Unpaid vet or board bills
  • Breaking a sales contract and/or being shitty during communication around a sale
  • Stealing show photos and using them in your social media

9th Circle: Unforgiveable

  • fat-shaming, whether in-person or online, public or private
  • sending a horse to auction
  • any kind of abuse
  • boyfriends/husbands who take the horses in the divorce/breakup
  • anyone who asks “when are you going to get over horses and get a life?”

 

Any other sins you’d add? Where would you put them?

philosophizing

Uncommon Praise

Amanda6 Comments

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the ways in which we talk about our horses.

There are set ways in which we praise them. They have good brains, expressive gaits, can take a joke, are easy keepers, have funny quirks, and more. The language becomes rote and set after a while, and it has its own internal structure. For example, when I wrote out “take a joke,” you have a clear sense of what that means, right?

Today, I want to hear about ways in which your horse is special that aren’t typical. What are the things you love and appreciate about him or her that don’t use words other people might? Not what you’d write in a sales ad so that everyone can understand his appeal – but the private reasons you cherish him.

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Here’s what I think about Tristan.

I love that he is wholly and unreservedly himself.

I don’t just mean that he has a quiet dignity – he does, most of the time. I don’t just mean that he has personality – boy, does he ever.

I mean that Tristan embodies a perfect blend of self-confidence and self-awareness. He has such a clear sense of his personhood (equine-hood?) that is totally lacking in doubt or equivocation. He engages with the world entirely on his own terms. He does not compromise the parts of him that are him, entirely. It doesn’t occur to him to compromise him.

It makes things harder, sometimes. For as much as I know he loves me, I also have a crystal-clear understanding that he exists wholly apart from me. He has a rich internal life and sense of the world, and a place in which he is entirely comfortable, without the need to relate himself to others beyond the equine negotiations that make up everyday social life. By that I mean – he understands the rules of a herd, and plays them, but he is not ambitious or insecure. He can usually be found on the edges of a fracas, biding his time and making choices.

You might say that I’m either anthropomorphizing or exaggerating.  Maybe I am. But I’ve known a lot of horses – and a lot of animals at large – and a lot of them are insecure or mutable. They see themselves very much in relation to others – whether of their own species or of humans. They’re highly sensitive social creatures whose personalities and outlooks can change depending on their company. There’s nothing wrong with that. It can definitely also be a desirable trait, in either a human or an animal. My dog, for example, is like that. A lot of horses are.

Tristan is not. Maybe it’s an artifact of being wild for so long, then neglected and on his own for so long. He was, for a full decade, just a horse. Nothing more, nothing less. He carries that within him still. It makes my life harder some days – everything between us is a measured conversation. Still.

But I love him for it.

So, is there something about your horse that’s not apparent to the casual eye? Something that you have to think through thoroughly to explain, but that draws you? Something that’s not the first, easy way you’d talk about him?