Not long after my immersion into the world of Seabiscuit I announced to my dear husband that I was thinking about “getting back into horses”. He mentioned rekindling his own interest in sailing, wondering if that would be of interest to me too. It wouldn’t, my sights were firmly set on horses. He did not try to stop me. Our urban San Francisco location did not immediately facilitate my goal, even though there was a riding stable in the city’s famous Golden Gate Park. I researched horseback riding lessons there and on the peninsula, the suburban, if not bucolic area south of the city known well as Silicon Valley. Each interview with a prospective facility began with the question of whether I wanted to ride English or Western. This shouldn’t have surprised me, but I realized that I hadn’t been leaning particularly toward either. I had been more times on a horse in Western tack than in English, but I was oddly baffled by having to make this choice before even starting. After a few of these interactions I discovered a small private facility that offered bareback riding lessons. That was it, no particular style choice required! I made arrangements for my first lesson and officially began exploring my new identity as an equestrian.
About twenty-five miles south of my house the bareback riding lessons took place on a small acreage tucked into a cozy valley. The ranch was invisible from the road by which it was accessed, but a line of houses from the adjacent neighborhood backed onto the ridge edging one side of it. Whether those neighbors appreciated the view I wouldn’t know. I saw the ranch as one world and the houses above as another. I thought of the ranch like a secret garden. Opening the locked gate to an environment of horses unseen from the world felt like heaven.
There were about a dozen horses in residence there. Most were owned by the proprietor and a few were boarded there by private owners. A well-worn rustic barn and a separate equally well-worn stable sat on top of a hill reached by a long driveway winding up from the gate. A small arena at one end of the barn looked out over an expanse of hillside that was used as a pasture for several of the horses. Across a ravine on the back side of that hill was another fenced area comprising another so called pasture used seasonally. Two individual paddocks with roof shelters near the barn and stable buildings provided individual living space for a couple of the horses.
My first time on a horse there escapes me. I can’t remember which horse or what the lesson entailed, other than feeling the life force of the horse going through me and knowing I wanted more. In fact, my memories of the period seem to start after I had become a regular student. I made friends with the boarders and other students and jumped at the opportunity to volunteer for feeding and mucking chores that allowed more time with and on the horses. The proprietor lived on site and was remarkably generous about access (though, this lessened his work load considerably and saved him having to pay for services). He even allowed us to camp overnight which fed the obsession of a couple of my friends there for immersing ourselves in the 24 hour life of horses.
Each of the horses possessed some especially attractive quality to someone so that he or she was a favorite of some person or two. Even though the horses were the property of the proprietor each horse received special attention from the student volunteers as if they were their own. Most of the horses I tended and rode were mustangs or quarter horses, yet there was one Thoroughbred, called Vegas. He quickly became my favorite. In my mind his Thoroughbred blood linked him to the mystique of Seabiscuit, the inspiration for my bringing horses into my life. Vegas was also an outsider to the proprietor’s other horses. Later I will share more about his story. For now I’ll just say that my attraction to him brought focus to my adventure as a horse woman.
A few months into regular association with these horses and the budding romance I felt with the equestrian world, I developed a taste once more for a horse of my own. It was amusing to realize that I no longer needed my parents’ permission! I decided to take a full year to learn everything I could about horses and to dedicate myself to the routine of horse ownership to make sure that I wasn’t just in the midst of a passing fancy. My attraction and attachment to Vegas grew and I imagined him returning to glory in a rags to riches story under my care. At the end of that year I was ready to commit to the responsibility and persuaded the ranch proprietor to sell Vegas to me.