As far as snorts go it was not particularly credible. Well not according to my trainer. Pathetic, she said. I tried again. Louder, she said. And I could hear her despair. This time I really put my back into it. Not too bad, she said. Would it kill you, I said, to be a little more forthcoming with the praise? That's when he walked into the room and let out a snort as derisive as it was hale, as mocking as it was aerated. Yay, she said. That's what we want! He grinned at me, on all fours on our kitchen floor, the broom propped up between two chairs at one end, mop across a couple of stools at the other. It looks like you've got your work cut out for you with that one, he said to her. Yes, she said, lunge training next. And then we've got jumps. See if she can clear 68cms this time. She needs to work on her canter, too. No, I said. I can't. Not tonight, please. But, she said, how will you ever get any better if you don't keep at it?
Perhaps, I said to my husband in bed that night, knackered, done in, it's time. I once met a woman who told me her every weekend was spent carting son and bike about the country to various motocross meets. More fool you, I thought. To let your child's hobby consume you like that. It's so important, I said to myself, to retain a sense of self as a parent.
Our daughter was 5 when first she rode a horse. She had been pestering and begging for over a year. As we arrived at the stables a man with three fully kitted-out teenage daughters, a float on the back of his 4WD, pulled up beside us. Mate, he said to my husband, taking in our small overly excited daughter, something worn-down in his voice, beaten, this could turn out to be the most expensive day of your life. We laughed. Ho, ho, ho. Oh no, we said. We're city slickers. This is a special treat. A one-off.
Unlike ballet, however, unlike soccer, unlike gymnastics, this was no flash in the pan, no trying on for size, this was it, this was love. And so what began as pony days in the holidays and horsey-themed birthday parties, became overnight camps and regular lessons. We held off on the lessons. Because of the drive. Because of the cost.
Approximately three times the price of other extracurricular activities, we said she would have to give up everything else. No problem, she said. Stupidly we thought that would be enough, would satisfy her for a few years. But now she wants her own horse. Cries herself to sleep thinking about it. Her conversations with equally horse-obsessed friends, drawn to each other like moths to light, are intense, competitive, endless. About Rosie's bouncy trot and Jet's cheeky buck. About the merits of bareback over the comforts of a Western saddle. And when there is no one else she makes do with us. Around the park and home again, while I sliced the courgettes and sauteed the onions for dinner, while I tested her on her spelling words and her basic facts, she held forth on what my dream pony might look like. What if I don't have one, I asked. And it was as if I hadn't spoken. Would he, she pondered, be 14 or 16 hands high?
