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// July 2 [Horseback Riding] 
// Story: Silver Glow's Journal 
// by Admiral Biscuit 
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 July 2 

I was pretty eager to get up and go, but Meghan wasn't. I didn't mind sleeping in a little bit late, 'cause it was nice to snuggle up to her, but eventually I thought it was time that we should get up and I had to pee anyway so I got out from under her arms and went to the bathroom and she still hadn't gotten up when I got back although her eyes were open.

She wanted me to come back to bed and I reminded her that we were going to go ride horses today and she said that we could still do that but five more minutes in bed wouldn't hurt especially since there was no point in taking a shower before we went.

Well, that was a good point, so I got back in bed with her but I didn't get under the covers and she held my hoof and kissed my nose and said that I was really cute when I'd just woke up.

That was nice of her to say, especially since I could see some of my mane was all tangled from sleep. I shook my head in the hopes of getting it more in order, and it stuck on my cheek so after she laughed at me she pushed it back with her hand.

Then she sat up and gave me a proper kiss and went off to the bathroom herself.

I got out my brush and was running it through my tail when she came out of the bathroom and took it from me and started to give me a proper brushing. Then she asked how I'd want my tail for riding horses and I hadn't really thought about it.

She asked me to stretch out on the futon and she could get on my back and show me how humans rode horses. I told her that I knew, because a girl at the Val Day had ridden me, and so had Trinity.

She said that they were kids, though, so maybe they weren't doing it right, and also I probably hadn't looked to see exactly what they were doing, which was a good point.

So I did and turned my head so I could see how it was done and she told me to keep my wings in and then got in bed next to me, sort of crawling on her knees, and she put her hand on my back to steady herself and then swung a leg over my back and sat down.

Then she kind of wiggled her butt on my back a little and tightened her legs against my side and said that that was how it was done. She said that if I was a riding horse, I'd also have reins that she would put in her hands, and a saddle horn that she could hold on to.

It was going to be kind of weird to balance like that and my hind legs didn't bend like a human's, so I wasn't sure that I could sit on a horse the same way.

She said that we might as well experiment, so she got off my back and lay down on her stomach on the futon and said that the first thing to do would be see if I thought I could balance myself well on her back.

I took my time placing my forehooves 'cause I didn't want to hurt her, and I asked before I put weight on them, but she kept assuring me that it was okay, and so I sort of stepped across her back until I was straddling her with my hind legs which felt really weird, and then I sat back and pushed myself up with my forehooves.

It didn't feel very natural at all, but I thought it would work all right. I said that it was kind of uncomfortable to have my hind legs spread like that, but I was pretty sure that it would work. So she asked how stable I felt, and I wiggled around a little bit and said it felt pretty good.

And she asked if my tail was going to be in the way, and it kind of was, but it was no worse than sitting in a chair. So I thought it would work out.

She wanted to try it kneeling, too, to take all the weight off my legs, because she said that might feel completely different to me. And so I got off her back and then we both got off the futon so that she could put the blanket on the floor to protect her knees. Then she told me to get back on the futon and she'd kneel right next to it and I could climb directly on her back like that.

It hurt my hips a little bit more when I didn't have my hind legs supporting any weight at all. It wasn't really a bad pain, more of a stretching in a way I wasn't used to. And there was a little bit more pressure on my dock than I would have liked, but it wasn't all that bad.

It turned out that the hardest part was getting back off of her. I couldn’t figure out how to do that without risking scratching her back with my hooves and I couldn't really pull either of my hind legs up to the point where I could use them. She had to crouch down, which looked really awkward for her.

So that was a problem we hadn't anticipated, and I was glad that we'd tried this.

We discussed it a little bit, and then I tried just sitting on her back like I would in a chair, and that worked out pretty well, but Meghan said I might have trouble balancing because of how much a horse's back moved as it walked. And I hadn't really thought about that, so she had me walk around the apartment and told me to pay attention to what my back was doing.

That was kind of weird. It was one of those things that I never really thought about, but she was right.

She said that we could try both methods with her crawling on all fours, and I said that she didn't have to because if something went wrong on the real horse, I'd just fly off. But she wanted to, so she put on her pants so that her knees wouldn't get scraped up on the floor and then had me get up on her back again, and we went around the apartment once with me sitting pony-style and once with me straddling her, and she was right that the second way was more stable, but it was a little less comfortable.

She told me that the only problem she saw was that horses were wider and taller.

Then we went to have breakfast and I wanted to make waffles since I still had some batter left but Meghan said it might have gone bad even though it was in the icebox, so we dumped it out in the sink and she mixed a new batch of batter with my last egg and said that the smart thing to do was to use all the batter at once and keep the extra waffles in the icebox.

So we cooked all the batter (the last little bit only made a half-waffle) and when we were done eating she put away the extras and told me that if I had saran wrap they'd stay fresher longer. She said that was the clingy kind of plastic that she'd put over her cookies. I didn't have any of it, though, so I went into the living room and wrote it down on my little shopping list.

Maybe I could go shopping with Meghan during the weekend.

She made an appointment for an Uber-car to pick us up, then she got dressed and we went outside to the balcony to watch for the Uber-car.

The man driving the car thought it was hilarious that we wanted to go to the riding stables, and he kept looking back in his mirror and snickering all the way there.

When we got out of the car, the smells of the stables hit me and I'd thought I was ready for it but I wasn't and I took a side-step and ran right into Meghan's legs and she put her hand down on my withers and that gave me a minute to collect myself.

I should have spent more time around Earth horses before we did this. Over the months since I'd been to the draft horse show, the memories had kind of dulled and faded and it took me a little while before I could bring myself to go forward.

Well, by the time I'd gotten my thoughts back under control, a lady had come out to greet us and so had a thin-nosed dog who sniffed at me then got behind me and barked and then went off in the direction of the barn before turning around and coming back.

I was kind of paying attention to the dog, and so I didn't really notice that we were slowly moving towards the barn until it suddenly got dark and I saw that we'd gone inside and the dog sat down and gave me a satisfied look.

I heard a horse nicker at me so I nickered back and then a head came over the wall next to me and I felt hot breath on my back and so I turned and blew into her nostrils and she pulled her head back then put it back down and sniffed at me and I sniffed at her and then we were friends.

The woman—who said her name was Deanne—asked me if I was sure about this. I guess while I'd been paying attention to the mare, she and Meghan had been talking.

I said that I wanted to and she asked if I'd even ridden a horse before and I admitted that I hadn't but I'd ridden Meghan this morning for practice.

Then she narrowed her eyes and asked if this was some kind of sick fetish because if it was we had better leave right now.

It took a little while to clear up that misunderstanding but finally Deanne agreed to let us try and I gave her my plastic money and so she went with us and helped saddle up the mare I'd met before who was named Hoshi, which she said meant star, and she said that she'd gotten that name because of the white blaze on her forehead.

Meghan got to ride a mare named Peaches, and Deanne rode her own horse who was named Henry. It was a lot of work for her, because she had to saddle Henry and Hoshi and also make sure that Meghan saddled Peaches the right way.

Then when I got on Hoshi she had to shorten the stirrups, which are little foot-cups. I couldn't use them, but if she left them dangling they'd be in the way, she said.

I kind of looped the reins loosely around my forehooves and then Deanne used her telephone to take a picture of me, and then we went out into the training pasture.

Hoshi seemed to know what to do, which was good because I don't think I was controlling her at all. I didn't want to pull on the reins and hurt her, so I let her do what she wanted, which it turned out was walking along the fence for a while and then leaning down to eat when she found a patch of grass she liked.

Deanne said that she was trained to get moving when people pushed their heels against her barrel but my legs didn't reach far enough down to do that, so we got in a line and when Peaches started walking at Meghan's directions, Hoshi followed her, and then Henry brought up the rear.

We spent an hour in the training pasture and Henry kept sticking his nose at me and sniffing and Deanne kept having to pull him back. And I couldn't really control Hoshi at all; she'd sort of respond to me tugging at her reins but she wouldn't go anywhere unless she had Peaches to follow.

It wasn't a total failure, though—the practice with Meghan had worked out pretty well so I didn't fall off.

We went on a little trail ride anyway, and the horses knew what to do, which was a relief. I could tell that this was a familiar thing for the horses, because they went along the path without much prompting, and Hoshi obediently followed Peaches for the most part, although there were a couple times when she stopped by a bush or tree that she liked and had some leaves and one time I ate a mouthful, too, just so see if they were as good as Hoshi seemed to think.

It was pretty good—it was sweet and sappy, and so I took a good look at its leaves and sniffed it so that I'd know to look for it in the future. I would have had another mouthful, but Hoshi had moved on a little bit and I couldn't reach any more.

When we were done with the ride we had to unsaddle the horses and rinse them off and Deanne did most of the work again and then she gave carrots to all the horses and because I asked nicely she gave me one, too.

I was pretty sore from riding and I saw that Meghan was walking a little bit funny, too.

While we were talking and waiting for the Uber-car to come and get us, we stayed inside the barn because the dog kept pestering me whenever I went outside but he didn't mind when I was in the barn. And Deanne said that they gave riding lessons and that if we worked at it perhaps I could get at least somewhat decent on a horse.

We had the Uber-car stop at Jimmy John's on the way home and we got sandwiches for a late lunch, and ate them out on the balcony, then went back inside and soaked in a hot bath for while which helped to relax my sore muscles. Then when the water had gotten cold and all the bubbles were gone, she drained the tub and we took a shower to wash off, then relaxed in the papasan and Meghan groomed me.

While she did, we talked about how the day had been and how weird it had been for me to ride Hoshi and she asked if I was going to want to do that again.

I said that I wasn't sure yet. I hadn't decided how I felt about it. Part of me thought that it felt like slavery, like we were taking advantage of them because they didn't know any better, but they seemed well-cared-for, and they were big enough that if they'd wanted to put up a fight I don't think any of us could have stopped them.

Then we sat and watched the birds for a while until we were both hungry again, and we decided to go back to Olde Peninsula because both their food and beer were good. Meghan got dressed in new clothes that didn't smell like horse sweat, and she reminded me to take my growler so we'd have beer to take home with us.

I got the smoked salmon poutine and she had a fajita thai roll-up and then we decided that since it was a holiday we were going to have dessert, too, so she ordered a peanut butter pie and I got a bread pudding and we shared them and they were both really good, too.

I was glad that we had to walk home, because we'd both eaten a little more than we should have.

It was dark by the time we got back home but we didn't go to bed right away. She sat in the papasan and I got up on her lap and we shared the growler between us and before it was even half-gone I fell asleep in her lap.

I don't remember falling asleep, but she woke me up when she had to get up and use the bathroom and she was kind of staggery and the growler was completely empty. She said she was sorry for drinking the rest but I didn't mind. And she was sort of swaying on her feet and so I let her put her hand on my back for balance and led her to the bathroom and waited outside so that she could use me to help walk back.

She made it to the futon without my help and also without her pants, then she fell onto it and I had to push her over a little bit so that there was room for me, too, and I couldn't get at the covers at all because she was on top of them.

I thought she might be cold without any covers, so I got one of the towels that wasn't too wet out of the bathroom and covered her legs with it then curled up next to her and fell back asleep.