She came back to me...

Over the weekend Lida and I were talking about when a horse drops its shoulder and spins back, and that all nine of my unplanned dismounts from Phebes have been as a result of EXACTLY that. Last time it happened she ran off, ran all the way home, leaving me anxious, and hiking out of the hills. Tonight I had decided that we were going to do some hill intervals, with one upward portion which is 1/4 mile at the canter, then three more times at the trot. Just whatever we could get done in the heat (91.5 °F heat index of 94 °F) and humidity ( 43%) this evening without pushing too hard. Coming down the hill to where our training loop begins I began to hear four wheelers over on the next hill, and Phebes spotted them working to clear some brush so they could bring the things our direction. I didn't want to be mixed up in any of that so I pushed her on down the hill and picked up the trot across the field that leads to our training hill. She was very tense going along the field, tipping her ears towards the four wheelers some where a ways behind us. I pointed her up the hill, and let her out into a nice slow canter. She was chugging right along at a nice clip as we approached the top of the hill, but still concerned about the where abouts of the two four wheelers (still behind us but on another trail) when a large crow goes flapping out of the brush. She drops her right shoulder and rolls back and hauls tail back down the hill, through the woods, heading full tilt towards the sound of those four wheelers. I radio home and let Doug know I'm down, pick myself up and discover a finger not working "just right" and limping a little on my right calf, and a minor headache from smacking my head yet again. My biggest concern though was the where abouts of my horse, and fear for her safety as she was running full tilt AWAY from the direction of home. Once up I called to her from the hill top trying to keep the stress out of my voice. At some point she turned around and came back to me. I was so happy to see her come trotting up the hill and stop about twenty feet from me, looking at me like, Mom ...are you mad? I approached real quiet, and told her what a good girl she was, and found my one and only carrot in her pack and gave it too her. She was all sweated up, and blowing pretty hard. She ended up with a harder workout than I intended to give her in this heat. I rode her just enough to show her the four wheelers weren't going to eat her, and the nasty crow was gone. Once she was calm we walked on home. Doug helped me cool her out by scraping while I sponged. She rolled in her favorite pile of dirt, and tanked up on water. But the important thing is Phebes came back to me and she is okay. We will see what the heat is like tomorrow and see if we can get that hill loop done right. ~E.G.