To make a long story short, because the horse was young and green broke, he was spooky on the trails, because he was so expensive (for her budget), she didn't dare turn him out in the fields with other horses because she was terrified he would get bitten or marked up in some way. She kept a blanket on him all the time so his coat wouldn't fade, she wouldn't let friends ride him because he was her show horse and in order to prepare him and her for the show ring, she hired a Quarter Horse trainer and started to pay huge amounts of money each month to get the horse ready for his first show and when it came time to go, she discovered that she couldn't afford to show at that level because you had to have a fancy saddle, fancy clothing, a fancy trainer, and your horse had to be able to compete against really expensive horses. Long story short, she never got to the show, never finished training the horse, lost money when she sold him AND soon discovered that she actually owned the perfect horse all along but now it was too late, she had sold her little appaloosa 700.00 horse.

I mention this story to you because that boarder hadn't really thought through what she would be doing with her horse 99% of the time. She just got stuck on the one thing she always dreamed of doing (1 big-time horse show) and ended up with a horse that was unsuitable for what she wanted to do 99% of the time and turned out not to be good enough to go to the fancy show anyway.

The moral of that story is two-fold: 1. the only way to really know which side of the fence the grass is greenest on, you have to really be clear about what you plan on doing with your new horse 99% of the time and only then can you make an informed decision. 2. Never judge a riding horse by his looks, size or fancy pedigree first– instead, judge a riding horse on his character, kindness, willingness and heart and only then should the other things come into play. This is no different than the selection process you would go through when choosing a home, a spouse, or your next car for that matter. Incidentally, I always thought the boarder’s small, Appaloosa horse was cute as a bug because I never looked at his outsides; I only looked at the things that really matter, his character, heart and willingness. Sadly, his owner got swept up in the “keeping up with the Jones’s” thing and had to have a bigger, cooler, slicker looking horse and gave no consideration to the suitability of the mount. The saddest part of the story is that the owner realized how beautiful her little Appy had been, only after it was too late. I want to hear from you! If you have any questions, comments or suggestions that you would like to share with the rest of us, drop me a line at: