Information about me
One of my earliest memories is when I was three years old and being too young to be left at home alone but not old enough to go to school I had to accompany my mother to a local farm where she used to earn money for those little extras by picking potatoes. It was the early fifties and in those days tractors were still a luxury for most farmers. This being the case for my mother's employer he had a pair of extremely large grey horses that used to pull the full carts of potatoes back to the yard. On the final trip of the day horses and workers would return to the yard together and of course I would be running along side. Sometimes the field was a long distance from the yard, too far for three year old legs to walk and so the farmer would hoist me up to sit astride one of these huge cart horses and I would ride back in style. I think perhaps that is where the seeds for my love of horses were sown.
Following on from those days and for quite a few years I 'galloped' everywhere. I cut out every picture of every horse from any paper or magazine I could find. I watched every cowboy film or indeed anything on television that featured a horse, even the racing. I wrote to Father Christmas year after year begging him to bring me a horse, I never gave a thought as to how he would get it down our chimney. Needless to say that horse never arrived.
When I reached the grand age of 11 years old my mother, who must have been driven mad by my obsession, agreed to pay for 'riding lessons.' These so called lessons were in truth the hire of a horse or pony for an hour for the sum of five shillings. You either stayed on or you fell off! No doubt you can guess what I did.
It was a husband, three children and thirty years later that I finally achieved my dream. Having produced at least one child equally as passionate about horses as I was we bought a dales pony to satisfy the obsessions of us both. We had that pony for five happy years until tragedy struck and she had to be put to sleep following a twisted gut. Horse mad daughter was now at university and following another dream so I embarked on a quest to find another horse for my sole use. I wasn't sure what I wanted, only that I didn't want a grey and I didn't want a thoroughbred. I looked at eighteen different horses from as far away as Hornsea in the north and Elstree in the south, none were right for me. Enter Sid a grey thoroughbred cross (or so the dealer said) from 4 miles up the road. Sid came to me on a months trial and almost fifteen years later is still here, though no longer on trial. Having gained his 2000 km. rosette with the Lindum group of Endurance GB he has nothing more to prove.
A day out at a local country fair was my introduction to the American Quarter Horse, until then I didn't really know such a thing existed despite all those cowboy films I watched as a child. Having seen a display of this magnificent beast and what they could do I just knew Sid would like one for a friend. This second quest took me to Wales where I met and fell in love with Seren Cracker Jack. Jack has now been with me for ten years. It went on from there and as my children left home so the horses moved in keeping me busy and fulfilling that dream I never lost sight of.