*FUMING*

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Get your walking sticks out guys!!!
 
I run a riding school,

Easiest way to find somewhere to help is go onto BHS website and look up riding schools near you. Email them and offer to help.

Ours is also a pony club centre and all of our helpers need to join the pony club (£22 a year) to be covered by insurance to help out. SOme of our helpers (i.e. the useful ones) get free rides in return if we have spaces in lessons. BUT they NEVER ask...it is offered.
 
I AM IN SUCH A BAD MOOD.[/B]
I'm sorry i don't mean to rant. It's just lots of people i know are getting new horses all the time. They just use them for the odd show once a month and then brag about how awesome they are. They hardley look after them either!! It's their mums or friends.
And then there's people like me, Who've always dreamt of a horse. Of eventing. And i don't get anything, not even the chance to event.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!!
Sorry it's been one of them days.
*Rant Over.*
When I was 13, right after the Falklands war when we went back to Argentina, I was fortunate enough that my grandmother was in a position to pay for me to have regular lessons. A few months later, completely unexpectedly, my uncle (professional SJer) gave me my first horse. A lovely showjumper. Gran paid for full livery, lessons, competitions etc. Was I able to ride every day? No, of course not; I couldn't drive and had school, homework etc. Did I look after my horse myself? No, but I did what I could at the weekends. Did I appreciate how fortunate I was? Of course. It was many years until I could afford a horse again, and I take rather a dim view now of anyone judging how/when I should should ride/look after my neds. You can't possibly know what goes on behind the scenes.
 
Only just:D:D
Obviously I have now reached coffin dodger age at 48:eek::D so I use a small set of steps now.

:D :D My mum didn't even start riding until she was 50! Was happily jumping within a few lessons and I'm sure she would have been stealing my ginger boy to compete on if she was still alive.

The only time I ever saw her struggle to get on was about 2 days after she ran the London Marathon :D
 
I have a big stump, tree, that I stand on, sadly cannot get off, so to do gates I have to bend like Olga Corbet to manage them. If you have to ask who she is, you are young enough to get on from the ground.
 
I dont follow it now either, but wasnt Ian Stark positively ancient ;) when he started eventing?

Nowhere NEAR as ancient as Australian Bill Roycroft - he was over 40 when he started eventing - and 45 when he won team Gold in Rome. His last Olympics was at the age of 61 (Monteal) where he and two of his sons secured Bronze. (He died earlier this year - aged 96!)
 
OP has said she is nearly 16.

OP has yet to experience quite a bit more in life before she (hopefully) realises to think about what she is posting. I teach students of OP's age several times a week. Often the mouth opens before the brain engages, OP is more than likely not even thinking that hoping for secondhand clothes might be construed as begging, most likely thinks she could be doing you a favour by taking them off your hands. I have given a few things away via freecycle recently, including a TV when someone asked if anyone has one.

I think some posters just need to lighten up a little. If what the OP says enrages you, then I'd ignore it.
 
Whilst I understand how frustrating it is to see other people enjoying their horses, I really wouldn't bother getting jealous about it.

I'm almost 21, and to date I have never owned my own horse. I started riding when I was a toddler, when family friends kindly let my mum teach me on their trusty old pony. My family could not afford to pay for regular riding lessons when I was a bit older, but I was treated to the occasional own a pony day at one of the local riding schools. One day when I was about 10 I was on one of these days and I saw a girl about the same age with her own pony, she'd obviously just come back from a show because she had a lovely red rosette pinned to her jacket. For a moment I felt jealous, but then I remembered what my Mum always said to me about being able to do anything if you put your mind to it. Age 10 I decided that one day I would own my own horse.

I came home that day and siphoned off half my pocket money, half went into a jar labelled "Horse Fund" and the other half was kept to do with what I like. 11 years later the fund is still going, except it's in the building society now - not a an old jam jar! Saving up so hard meant that yes, sometimes I did go without - I couldn't upgrade my phone as often as my friends, I didn't just run out and buy new things because I fancied them and my school lunch was sandwiches - not yummy treats from the school cafeteria!

My parents were lucky enough to be able to get me into regular lessons shortly after the fund was started, and I rode that way until I was about 17. In the past 3 years I have sat on a horse once, and that was because my friend let me try her gelding one day. After my year abroad is finished I'm joining the university riding club, I'm going to have lessons for a year and then look to buy my own once I have graduated, found a job and sorted out some accommodation!

I guess what I'm trying to say is, these things don't come overnight. Yes it can be frustrating and can make you wish that you were in a different financial situation, but instead of letting it make you bitter why not channel that into a positive outcome? Get a job, start saving up and in the meantime do what I'm having to do; help your horsey friends out wherever possible and read as much literature on all things horsey as you can.

Just think how amazing it will feel when you manage to have your own, personally I can't think of anything better. And one day, I WILL get that red rosette of my very own!!
 
The breeder I bought my Highland pony from still rides and breaks her youngstock and she is 71. Works a seven day week on the stud too, up at 6am every day. I hope I have half her energy at that age!
 
OP has said she is nearly 16.

OP has yet to experience quite a bit more in life before she (hopefully) realises to think about what she is posting. I teach students of OP's age several times a week. Often the mouth opens before the brain engages, OP is more than likely not even thinking that hoping for secondhand clothes might be construed as begging, most likely thinks she could be doing you a favour by taking them off your hands. I have given a few things away via freecycle recently, including a TV when someone asked if anyone has one.

I think some posters just need to lighten up a little. If what the OP says enrages you, then I'd ignore it.

^^^^ this

Although I am 40 and seriously considering flinging myself around an xc course for the first time :D
 
.

I came home that day and siphoned off half my pocket money, half went into a jar labelled "Horse Fund" and the other half was kept to do with what I like. 11 years later the fund is still going, except it's in the building society now - not a an old jam jar!

Forget all the rest of these posts what happened to the dam Jam Jar?
 
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