Sometimes we need to get away from what we do to appreciate the rest of the world. Sometimes we have to get away from what we do to appreciate what we do. Looking out helps us look in.

As I write, a thunderstorm is fighting its way across the craggy peaks of the Colorado Rocky Mountains. The winds make the Ponderosa pines and Aspens seem to shrug their indifference as they cling to the boulder-strewn sides of this secluded valley. While the storm brings with it a cooling and cleansing of the air, the same storm hurries the current in the North Fork of the South Platte River. A dichotomy. The same forces that bring peace and fulfillment also create energy.

The horses and riders seemed to borrow the energy as we raced the storm back to the ranch. We made it down the trail in time to avoid getting too wet, thanks to our slickers and the wranglers, with horse and human energized from the storm.

I took a few days off, away from work and family, to “freshen” for the arduous summer ahead. Quiet moments that take you “close to the woods.” (This thought process I borrowed from one of my mentors. The phrase refers to those people who are close to the earth–farmers, woodsmen, pioneers, and very often, horse people.) Most of us today are two generations or more away from the “woods” of our grandparents or great-grandparents. When was the last time you made (or ate) home-canned pickles, green beans, or preserves?

Enough beating around the bush. I’m really talking about our lives with horses.

Many people equate riding or being around horses with the same curiosity and distance that we have when thinking about canning pickles. “Quaint, pleasant, and while I might like doing it, and would enjoy the results, it really is too much trouble. Next thought.”

Many of us make our living from horses, be we editors, farm or barn managers, breeders, veterinarians, farriers…the list goes on. But are we still enjoying the main reason we work? I have been reminded repeatedly in the past few days how blessed I am to be doing something for a living that I love. But sometimes my life gets so wrapped up in the doing that I forget that I really, truly, without a doubt, want to be around horses.

Why wouldn’t we want to share that passion with others?

People in the business are warily enthusiastic about the current state of affairs in the horse industry. There are more and more people interested in experiencing horses through riding, taking lessons, buying horses, and attending horse events. And I don’t see this trend changing for the next three generations.

The current generation is people like me, and most of you. We are educated, have careers, and finally have enough disposable income to do what we have always wanted to do but couldn’t find the time or extra money–enjoy horses. Many of us are sharing this with our families. I take delight in going to horse shows and competitions of all types and seeing family participation. Mothers and daughters, fathers and sons, husbands and wives, brothers and sisters…they are all out there together. And in this age of families wanting to recreate together, horses provide the perfect answer.

How wonderful it was to see Danielle Kanavy and her mother, Valerie, finish one-two in the most prestigious endurance competition in the world–the FEI World Endurance Championships (The Horse of November 1996, page 47). They enjoyed comraderie, and competition. Where else can that happen but with horses? Equestrian games are the only discipline in the Olympics that allow men and women to compete equally and together.

But, what I’m seeing on other levels is surprising. There are parents taking their children to ride, and with no background in horses themselves, climbing up and taking lessons in the same ring! That not only shows courage as they put themselves on the same level as their kids (who will probably advance more quickly), but the initiative to try something new. And they are doing this with horses.

Back At The Ranch

An Orvis fly-fishing clinic with Kevin Gregory, one of the top guides in Colorado, was offered at Karen and Dean May’s North Fork Guest Ranch in Shawnee, Colo. That’s akin to attending summer camp and finding out George Morris is giving riding lessons! (Orvis, America’s oldest mail-order company, began selling top-quality fly fishing equipment in 1856. All over the world there are fly-fishing educators and guides who are “Orvis-endorsed” professionals.)

I’ve always loved fishing, and this I wanted to try. Gregory has a passion for what he does. Because of that passion, he took a group of rank beginners and had us casting lines straight and true (albeit in a horse pasture) in a couple of hours. Everyone thought it was worth the time by the end of the day when we all cast our flies (more or less in good form) onto a stocked pond at the ranch and played trout to a standstill. (Proper release was an integral part of the day’s instructions.) Even if just one of the four gets involved–buys a rod and reel, flies, and other equipment–that increases the sport. Multiply that by the number of guests at that ranch and other ranches during the summer and, well, I guess Orvis knows what it is doing with small-group marketing.

Riding is the same. Those with any background or footing in the sport are the easiest converts to full-timers. Those with interest will be a harder sell, but it can be done.

What would happen if at every horse show there were an hour set aside to introduce horses to the public? What if at every penning, roping, or rodeo event fans had the opportunity to touch the horses and talk to the competitors?

People are “discovering” horses at a rapid rate these days, and we as passionate professionals in the industry need to make it easier for the general public to get involved.

After all, horses are our fresh breezes on stormy days.