For some reason I have been unable to get into the Christmas spirit this year. For the first time in my life I did not set up Christmas tree or decorate the house with cute lights that always used to brighten my spirits. I've been so caught up with work for Eurodressage and the University of Brussels that I could not get my mind round the holidays.
But I've cleaned up my act! I finished all the annoying chores of bookkeeping, paperwork, and running errands (read: buying Christmas presents) and can finally breathe again. It's Christmas Eve, I'm sitting in front of the burning fire place, glass of wine at hand waiting for Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers to start soon. In the meantime, I'm loosing chips with online poker (of course not playing for real money) on Facebook. When will the good times come?
Though the period leading up to Christmas has been quite stressful, everything is quite well organized in my head . I don't have particular New Year Resolutions for 2009 as I am very pleased with the life I live, the people I have around me and love, and my horses. I have retired my riding horse Grace in November. After yet another tendon injury, I called it quits. A few years ago I had to pull her through colic surgery and two leg surgeries to be able to ride her again for one year before she got injured again. She ruptured her suspensory ligament in the spring of 2008 and had five months off. She's turning 17 in March 2009 and I did not want to get her back in full training, to ride her for a few months and then be forced to retire her again because of yet another injury.
My horse joined my pony in retirement in a herd of six on eight acres of luscious land. In one week time, she got turned out more hours than she would have in two months at the high performance barn she used to be stabled at! My horse has becomes totally attached to my old pony (from which she was separated a year ago when my pony moved home 12 months earlier) as if it was a reunion of an adopted child and her biological mother.
I even took her on her first ever hack in the woods! I had not really ridden her in the woods because I'm the scardy cat who freaks out beforehand about "possible" tractors, quads, galloping horses, dogs on the loose that might "attack" us and make me fall off my horse and her on the run towards a busy road. I bought myself a GPA Titium safety helmet, put on a very courageous face, and saddled up. She was absolutely PERFECT, did not spook once and I was relaxed the entire ride. What a revelation.
This official hack will not be the only "first" of the year. For 2009, I have many plans for Eurodressage and we'll be expanding with a new website, which is still a secret. Eurodressage itself will stay the same with its news and show coverage, but we have a totally new layout design in the pipeline as I write.
Eurodressage will continue to serve the needs of the online dressage community and we wish all our readers a merry Christmas and a happy, healthy, prosperous New Year.