The Thinking Man’s Horse (no…not exactly…more correctly: The Thinking Horse’s Man)
The other day Bill was riding Zeloso outdoors on a grassy area. Zeloso really wanted to eat the grass. The horse has some very interesting moves. His “go to” trick is to ask for the reins to be loosened so that he can stretch. (Bill used to fall for that one several times during each ride.) In a split second after Bill released the rein contact, Zeloso’s nose would be deep in the grass and it was quite a tussle to get the horse’s head back up into riding position.
Zeloso could also out-maneuver Bill at the halt. The horse would offer a classic “on the bit” pose, then down his head would go, but on this particular ride Bill was doing an excellent job of keeping Zeloso’s nose no lower than his chest. Well, good ole Zeloso did some calculating and figured if he got onto his knees the grass would be a lot easier to eat. So, with Bill on his back Zeloso dropped to his knees (very deftly, softly). The good news: Bill stayed in the saddle. The not so good news: Zeloso was eating grass.
At first Bill was quite surprised and a worry or two entered his mind including, “What on earth caused this horse to lose both front legs? Is he injured?” (Bill’s never had any horse drop to its knees.) Then Bill realized what Zeloso was up to and was mightily relieved! However, he didn’t tell me how he got Zeloso back up on all four feet. That was probably highly entertaining!
