Rant Alert: I feel cheap and resentful.

I'm going to put a rare "rant for the sake of ranting" post here because the place/web forum that I usually rant about horse-related stuff may not be appropriate ... the person/situation I am ranting about may read it (its a small world you know!)  Normally I don't condone ranting if you're not going to do something to fix whatever's got yer panties in a knot but I'm not ready to deal with this head on yet.  Maybe I am making mountains out of mole-hills. Since I only have ~1 subscriber here now (and its not her), I think I'm safe to rant my heart's content haha.

Background:
I have someone boarding their horse at my acreage, we'll call the horse 'D' and the owner is 'T'.  I wasn't planning on doing that but it seemed like an OK idea at the time. T explained that she rode quite a bit as a kid and that having a horse as an adult is fulfilling a bucket list item.  "Getting back into horses" was a bucket list item of mine several years ago and I truly appreciated some thoughtful assistance to make that happen when I bought Cash.  So I felt good about paying it forward to someone else's B-list. She's a nice person, beautiful family and her enthusiasm is infectious; I need injections of enthusiasm from time to time and her gentle prodding for me to ride more ... hasn't actually gotten me riding more but its good for me to be pushed outside my comfort zone sometimes.  As well, I could use some help looking after the horses once in a while.  But I am really second guessing this boarding arrangement.

The Rant:
I noticed almost from the outset that T is very green with horses.  She does a lot of things that I would not do and I believe to be ... well, wrong and/or dangerous and/or just plain foolish.  I myself am not an expert on horses so I am reluctant to say too much for fear that she may know more than I give her credit for and I know that I tend to err way too far on the side of caution.  The part that bothers me is that she doesn't seem interested or open to learning.  She has other 'horsey' friends that she trusts who are not shy about offering their opinions so I leave it to them to be her circle of influence for now.  I generally keep my opinions and judgements to myself.

Speaking of T's 'horsey' friend, T texted me a few days after D arrived that her friend came out to see him and she (the 'horsey' friend) said there's something wrong with Cruz (my new horse).  I kind of panicked, I had just moved Cruz home and had just seen him earlier that morning to check on a nasty cut he had on his shoulder.  No, its his feet she tells me.  I'm still panicked.  His feet were fine when I saw him, what's wrong now?!  When I checked on him, it really was nothing.  Some cracks on his hoof that are not unusual late in summer when the pastures are dry and their hooves dry out.  Me thinks it was just T trying to sound knowledgeable (which she clearly wasn't) and her (judgemental?) horsey friend made a comment on one of my horses.  I try not to be one of the stereotypical judgemental "horse" people but at that point I really wasn't impressed with 'horsey' friend or with T.

Riding with Uggs ... or hiking boots or runners or any footwear without a heel: not a good idea.  Since my first memories of riding with my parents as a wee whippersnapper, I have always been taught that footwear with a heel is non-negotiable.  If you get into a wreck, your (heel-less) foot slips thought the stirrup and you are dragged to your death, its your own fault!

Riding a new horse (if you've only owned him for 5 weeks, he's still 'new' to you IMO) bareback, with a rope halter in the pasture.  I dunno, just seems like an 'advanced' rider activity, not to be attempted by beginners.

Hand feeding treats to a horse that tends to be dominant.  And D is definitely dominant when he thinks he can get away with it!

D was gelded late; from what his former owner says he managed to knock up several mares before he was snipped so I'm guessing he was done at 2 or 3 years old, possibly later (he's ~15yo now).  He is quite "studdy".  My first "note to self" on his dominant nature was shortly after he arrived: D and Cash were together in the pasture; I was petting Cash who has improved A LOT in letting me approach him and pet him anywhere anytime.  I was lovin' on him for being such a good boy when he started to get antsy and pull away.   Low and behold, here comes D, literally pushing himself in between Cash and I, ears pinned as flat as they will go!  Naturally Cash was nervous and pulling away which is EXACTLY the thing I am working on him to NOT do!  I backed off D three times before he finally stayed away and let me get back to my boy Cash.  I have to say, that experience gave me some confidence; I dealt with D instinctively and immediately and without one iota of intimidation or fear.  I was in charge.

Speaking of D's former owner, apparently she showed up at my acreage one day to see him without any communication with me ... the land owner.  She texted T after she visited and apparently T told her that she needs to call ahead next time.  If that went down the way T says, I can't fault her for that.  And its not the end of the world that this lady came to see her baby ... but I was rather annoyed that someone would invite themselves onto my private property and not tell me. A courtesy call goes a long way to keeping good feelings! I will be installing that security system sooner rather than later.

When D is acting up, T will "run him in circles" (aka free-lunging) to get him to behave.  She doesn't really know why one does that except that 'horsey' friend showed her that.  I am not a lunging expert but from what I see, she's doing it wrong and D is confused.  I once free-lunged D because he was being a turd to me at feeding time; he is actually very good at it, he knows the deal!  It only took a couple of laps around the pen before he stopped, joined up with me and there were no other problems that day.

T is also very high energy and D is sensitive to that.  I've noticed that when she arrives to work with D, all of them get more edgy.  On one occasion, she was running D in circles in the pen because she couldn't catch him.  Cash was in the pen as she was doing that and I could see him getting quite riled up ... he is also quite attuned to a person's energy and he was also being given the run around.  This was one of the rare occasions that I spoke up, I asked her to please stop while I get Cash out of there.  As worked up as he was, my boy Cash stood still while I walked up to him with the halter, put it on and lead him out.  Wow!  As irked as I was that she was potentially spoiling my horse, I was so proud of him for being a good boy for me :-)  I have been working on this since I brought him home, he likes the "you can't catch me" game so it was really gratifying to see that the effort paying off. 

One evening when the mosquitoes were particularly bad, I fly-sprayed all three of them.  Cruz was the least bothered by this, just stood at the hay bin while I sprayed him down, no halter or anything.  Cash was not as apathetic and I needed to catch him for this.  D was also not so cooperative, he was actually being an evasive turd!  Took him less than 1 minute to figger out that I would have none of it, he turned to face me and off we went to finish the task at hand.  From what I'm told, T has problems catching him (and tries to solve it by the 'running in circles' thing) so I feel a teensy bit vindicated that my calm, methodical, patient approach is a better way.  One can't be in a hurry when it comes to the horses, that much I have learned!

Cruz is very thin and ribby.  I'm not sure if that's a young thoroughbred thing or if he just needs to eat more.  He is also the bottom of the pecking order while D is top dog. At one feeding, D was running Cruz out of the pen entirely so that Cruz wouldn't have gotten any supper if I hadn't been there.  So I brought Cruz back in, locked D out, when Cruz was done eating, I let D back in to finish his supper.  Sorry, my horses eat first.  Period.

I am still quite tentative about riding Cash after last year's little "eat the dirt" incident.  Totally irrational after all this time I know, but I still am.  T was texting me to go riding with her and I explained that I will ride Cash in the arena if it is not too muddy but I won't ride him out in the pasture.  And I won't ride Cruz until we've worked through some ground-manners issues.  Her response was "Do you want me to ride him (Cash) for you?"  HA!  I actually laughed out loud to that.  Really?  You think you're *that* good that you can ride a (very tall) horse (that she is otherwise kind of intimidated by) that's been known to buck?  It just proved to me how naïve she is ... and not going to lie, I was kind of insulted.

Part of the reason I don't ride with T is I don't feel confident that if something were to happen, she could handle the situation.  She's obviously green which makes me feel like I have to be responsible for everyone and everything ... and I'm just not that confident in my own abilities to take on the additional responsibility.  And I don't feel confident that she's open to my suggestions on how to avoid bad situations.

T texted me last week to ask if she could bring her targets and cross-bow to practice at my place.  I didn't respond because, frankly, I'm not crazy about it.  I'm just not a "weapons" person.  The next day when I went out to feed the boys, she came out.  We were having a friendly chat when another pick-up came down the road.  Since my acreage is such that any vehicle coming down that road is obviously coming to my acreage I pointed it out.  Oh yeah, her Dad is coming out, they are going to shoot some targets.  Wha ...?  Really?  I didn't actually agree to that.  I didn't say anything in that moment, its a relatively harmless activity and I was taken off guard but it made me realize that I need to start reining in how she is using my property as if its her own.  Ask permission and so you won't have to ask for forgiveness!

I let all three of the horses out into the big pasture this weekend since I was going out of town for a few days.  They can eat grass and don't need their twice-daily dose of hay.  I texted her that we can leave D in the pen (which was her preference) but she would have to feed him.  Apparently she didn't have time or didn't want to (so my idea that I would have help once in a while to look after them hasn't panned out as I thought it would) so she agreed to let him out ... but I was to bring him back in when I return.  I decided that no, I'll do what's easiest for me.  Its not part of the agreement that I drive out twice a day specifically to feed only her horse, nor is it my responsibility to bring him in from the pasture.  The whole reason she boarded at my place was so her horse could be out in the pasture to "be a horse" and not be cooped up in a small paddock.  But it seems that now she wants him in the pen because its more convenient ... but doesn't want to or doesn't have time to look after him when he's in the pen.  So I'm expected to do it.

She went out to work with him this afternoon and had to retrieve him out of the pasture, had some trouble with that from what she said.  She left him in the pen again.  I warned her that I may not be able to go out and feed him tonight but she thinks he will be fine until tomorrow morning (so 16 hours without food).  I don't think that's healthy for him but that was her choice.  As time goes by I am less and less willing to 'jump' at everything.

The latest "issue" is that she bought "halfers" in a 3 month old filly that her 'horsey' friend has and she would *really* like to keep it here.  I'm a little perplexed as to what a green rider/trainer is going to do with a baby horse but that's not my call.  I suspect she's still riding the emotional high of having D in her life and wasn't really thinking about how this is really going to work out in the long run.  When I first met T, before she even bought D, I was very specific that I am only willing to accept geldings.  Cash gets funny around the mares and I just don't want to deal with the hassle and stress of it.  So why she thinks a young filly would get a  different answer ...?  In all honesty, it just sounds like more work for me.  My diplomatic answer was that the grass in the pasture can really only support 4 horses so if my niece's horse comes back, its maxed out (which is the honest truth.) Her response was, "OK its your place."  Yes, yes it is!  She's willing to pay more if she can bring it, would that change my mind?  I pointed out that the herd dynamics we got going on there would be challenging and its probably not even safe for the filly.  T says we would separate her for a while, obviously, but I don't think she's thought this one through either: I only have one pen ... and D is using it!  So where, pray tell, are we going to put this new filly?  Build more fences?  Again, that just sounds like more work/expense for me. I've kind of been letting other things slide but on this, I stand my ground.  It kind of reminds me of a former (problem) boyfriend who used to pester me with the same question over and over again in slightly different ways hoping I would relent and give him what he wanted!  OK, seriously, she's not as bad as that... but it does remind me of him and his very exhausting tactics.

Did I mention that I am charging a very reasonable rate to board D?  And that includes hay which is uber expensive and hard to find this year?!  In T's defence, she has been very proactive in sourcing out hay which I did appreciate.  But I am not coming out ahead financially on this.  Me thinks this is the lesson: if you set your self up as 'cheap', people treat you as if that's exactly how much you are worth.

I guess the long and short of it is that there have been a few good things about having a boarder and a few things I did not expect. I won't evict T and D but I won't be sorry if/when she decides to move him somewhere else and I suspect she will do that sooner rather than later. I probably won't take on another boarder, I have Cash and his sidekick, Cruz and possibly Benji, my niece's horse so he won't end up in the hands of a meat buyer. 

And honestly, my acreage has become my happy place and I am struggling with sharing my sanctuary.  Having to look after someone else's horse takes away from my quality time with my own guys.  I can't have my 'alone' time out there when someone else is there.  And I resent 'strangers' coming to my place and treating me like I'm invisible (T's Dad and in-laws barely acknowledged me; D's former owner didn't bother to call me when she visited.)  Maybe that is what's the crux of all of this.  My personal space.  My peace and quiet.  My joy.  I was out of town on Friday and Saturday for a course, I went out on Thursday night to get the boys ready and by Saturday night, I felt like I HAD to get out there to check on them before I could go home and go to bed.  It was pitch dark and I could barely see what was there ... but once I saw them petted them, smelled them, said "Hi guys", my world was right again.

There.  That's the end.  It was *much* longer than I expected but my rant is finished ... for now anyway.