It took me years to understand that not only is the concept of lightness relative, but also the concept of result. Horses' memory is immense, which makes this animal extraordinary more than any other characteristic.
I had the first concrete proof of this years ago, when I accompanied Francesco to visit his elderly trotter on the lawn. While we were there chatting, Francesco playfully called Teresa's attention by raising her right leg with her knee up. The mare immediately imitated him by repeating an exercise that he had learned in the distant past and which he had not performed for at least 15 years. However, he was so imprinted in his memory that he came back to light even at his venerable age. I was struck by observing that small and simple proof of what I had only read in books.
This incredible memory, this extraordinary ability, however, can prove to be a major impediment when talking about horses whose memories are traumatic. How many times have I been asked “but are there any horses you have given up on?” As if the retraining process were an obstacle course, a head-to-head challenge between the trainer and the horse. As if it were a question of crossing the finish line or not.
Ensueño was the first horse I broke and trained
It was a Lusitanian stallion that Francesco had bought at the price of meat following a recommendation from a friend. He had an ugly scar on his forehead and behind him a violent attempt at taming, inside the cow labor, with his legs tied. I don't know what other abuse he had suffered, but he was one of the most terrified creatures I have ever seen in my life.
The taming was truly complex, Ensueño had sudden panic attacks that dangerously put the knight's safety at risk. It took time, patience and skill to gain his trust and make him a reliable horse. Despite his character difficulties, he had an extremely elastic body and an innate sensitivity to aid which allowed me to obtain a good level of training in a short time.
As the training progressed, however, when I began to raise the level of demands, creating greater brilliance, demanding greater commitment, the horse stopped progressing. He became tense and anxious, making it difficult for me to bring him back to the initial state of relaxation. I worked on it for a long time, obtaining mediocre results and obviously blaming it on my technical shortcomings.
Only later, with the experience of dozens more horses behind me, did I understand that as much as my inexperience had contributed, the focal point was elsewhere. Ensueño, with his traumas and his delicate psychophysical balance, could not handle the "pressure" of superior training. That passage was simply too much for him on a mental level, as if the space was finite and I was trying in vain to fit more into it.
So I started to imagine a horse's mind as a book whose number of pages is pre-established from birth
If out of 200 pages, 150 have been filled with horror, you will still only have 50 pages on which to rewrite a new story. This makes the retraining process so complicated, in no case can you erase what has already been written.
If you are lucky enough to be able to fill more than half the book, you will be able to have a horse again, pass me the unfortunate term, normal. But if most of the pages have already been written in terms of time or intensity, then there will be very little space to rewrite.
We can only do the best with the space we have available, after which it is not a question of giving up, but of avoiding creating further confusion. Despite our pride, the mental limits of a traumatized horse must be respected.
Something similar happened with Celestino
He too is a recovery, a book full of horrors, with perhaps two or three blank pages. A kwpn of incredible strength that I purchased at a low price because it was in terrible condition. Stunted and prone to running away as soon as he felt the weight of someone in the saddle, he worked completely upside down, with a stiff back and wide eyes.
After a period of retraining on the flat, he became a technically complex horse but rideable at three gaits. Regarding the jumping, the starting situation was disastrous: the horse was not even able to calmly climb over a barrier at a hand-paced pace.
Now, after seeing many jumping horses, I think they tortured him with electric prods because his terror at the sight of an obstacle spread through the air like a toxic cloud. After months of work he certainly improved, but at the first tiny inconvenience he went back to page 1, launching himself against the jumps like a fury, exploding into the air with a margin of more than a meter above the barrier and then running away in a totally uncontrolled manner. I could sense his total anguish and that feeling drowned out all the joy for the daily progress achieved. It was in one of those moments that I decided to stop blowing it completely. Someone might now say "but then you gave up on this horse!".
Celestino has lived his life for years with Francesca, who knows how to manage a horse that is potentially dangerous for himself and others, who has created a special relationship with him made up of small requests and a lot of understanding. Celestino, despite being one of the most traumatized horses ever, had a future, we filled those two blank pages with a few but wonderful words. The result was not determined, as I thought, by being able to bring him back to the competition fields to jump. Although personal pride can play an important role, true success lies in giving a second chance, in recovering an otherwise lost life, and no, it doesn't necessarily have to be a masterpiece.
Edited by Giulia Barberis, for Fedda.
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