Actress Diary #13

Monday July 14th 2008

Well, starting tomorrow school holidays are officially over! That means early mornings and rushed showers for Melissa! I’m starting to get a bit concerned about getting a job, and having to start in the early afternoon, therefore meaning that I won’t be able to feed Actress or do an evening session with her – so that’s kinda annoying, but on one of my online applications I added “I would preferably like to start my shifts around 4:30-5:00 as I have duties at home” or something along those lines. I doubt any one will employ someone as fussy as me!

Anyway, I’ll update you on the last two days because they’ve been somewhat productive. Firstly, yesterday morning Actress neighed to me! She’s never neighed at me before and I took it as a big step forward in our relationship. It sounded like “Oh there you are! How are you? It’s good to see you again” So I felt very special and made lots of baby noises towards her (you know like “owwh yooh such a goowd wittle babyeeee, yesh yooh are! Yesh yooh are!” haha)
Then in yesterdays evening session I bought out two white poles and stuck them in the ground. Yay obstacles! Well, Actress firstly was not leading fluently so that meant trying to achieve a large, figure eight wasn’t exactly going to work. She had a sniff at the poles and reluctantly walked in between them when I waved the feed bucket around trying to coax her through. We managed to go around one of the poles, but I wouldn’t say it was the exercise I was hoping to achieve, but it showed her something new.

This morning I wanted to attempt the poles again, but…she wasn’t as compliant. Really I can’t remember this morning very well, but it was some extra exposure for her. This afternoon I wanted to get her used to me standing beside her, because she’s used to seeing me front on. I started with the usual trying to pet her on the head and if she moved backwards I’d yield her hindquarters. Surprisingly, Actress wasn’t her usual wonderful self, or perhaps I was being more critical and yielding her when one foot moved back, but hey, you need to be! Then when she was quite happy with me standing there patting her, and keeping in mind the think principal the whole time, I tried just moving the angle my body was at when I was patting her so I was standing beside her head. A couple of times she moved back, but in the end she didn’t move so that was wonderful. I gave her plenty of thinking time and not wanting to push it I finished after the second or third time of her being ok as I moved my feet and let her finish her feed.

Really going well. I love her to bits too!

Actress diary #12: A special day.

Thursday 10th of July 2008

Sorry for the recent lack of updates. My best friend came down to visit me so I was slightly preoccupied. But that didn’t mean Actress stopped learning, she was amazing these last few days, especially when she was quite comfortable having two people around.

But nothing can compare to the amazing session we just had.

I quite possibly have the most amazing horse in the world.

I wandered outside at around 4:30pm, the sun had set behind the trees but the sky was still bright blue, the wind however was icy cold. To begin with Actress was ignoring me, but only for a couple of seconds until she realised I had the yummy chaff and copra. She allowed me to pick up her lead quite soon and didn’t have a problem with me crouching down in front of her. I wanted to work on being able to pat her head without her moving backwards, of course, if she moved backwards she had to yield her hindquarters. I only had to yield her ONCE before she was more than happy to let me stroke her forehead. Do you realise how overjoyed I was? This beautiful little brumby did not care if I pet her. Of course, she is not perfect, and once or twice she moved a foot back, but generally she was perfect! It was so special to be standing there with her. I decided to see if she would lead around. But I was determined not to pull at her lead or anything forceful like that. I wanted Actress to lead around without pressure. And she did! Beautifully in fact! The lead was always kept slack, if I turned away from her completely had my head down, and my palm had to be facing upwards she would gladly step forward towards me and follow around, of course once we were wandering around I was allowed to move my head around and ‘look for danger’ as any good herd leader would do. It felt magical to have Actress following, either behind or next to me, no pressure at all. This truly was a special day and I feel I haven’t been able to capture how special this was to me, but it most certainly was the most amazing thing me and Actress have ever done. This little brumby is really starting to trust me and love me.

I have a theory. Yesterday my blood blister ‘disappeared’. I won’t explain how, but it was removed and I was more than overjoyed to have won that battle with the disgusting little thing. If you didn’t know, that blister arrived when Actress did. And is it not coincidental that the day after the blood blister disappears, me and Actress bond like we never have before? I think that signalled the new beginning, of a fantastic new partnership!

I have now had Actress for about 2 ½ weeks.

Actress in the fog early yesterday morning