COMMENT OF THE DAY:
"Kim" had a wonderful story about Charisma from last Friday's post. It's amazing how these horses impact our lives, despite the fact that we may never even meet them in person.
The first time I ever even saw eventing was in 1984. I was 17, had longed for years to someday learn to ride a horse (I was still a few years away from it). On a summer afternoon I flipped on the tv to whatever the coverage was from the LA Olympics, and saw the most wonderful thing--gorgeous acres of green, huge solid jumps, horses galloping over things I'd never dreamed existed. It was cross country, and I was mesmerized, hooked from that moment on. A few days later I sat with my boyfriend and parents to watch the closing ceremonies, and into the LA Colisseum came two big horses and one little. Then the riders dismounted--two little and one big. Mark Todd and Charisma had won their first Olympic medal.
I started riding a little over a year later, but it wasn't until almost twenty years after that that I finally began to event. Charisma's photo hangs in my guest bathroom (my husband--that boyfriend of 25 years ago--won't let me hang it above our bed). I'll vote for Charisma first, last, and always. What a horse!
TODAY'S MATCHUP: Best of the US
Who will earn the right to represent the Stars and Stripes in the final showdown? Both (2) CUSTOM MADE and (1) WINSOME ADANTE proved their competitive greatness on the biggest of stages. Tailor has an Individual Olympic Gold; Dan has an Individual Silver, Team Bronze, and WEG Team Gold. Tailor won Badminton; Dan won Rolex three times. Both excelled in all three phases, in the long format. I would give a slight edge to Winsome Adante; David O'Connor was a very big name aside from Custom Made, but Dan really pushed Kim Severson to the top of the world scene. I don't think you can go wrong selecting either horse!
1. WINSOME ADANTE vs. 2. CUSTOM MADE
Another story! Eight years ago, when my children were 4 and 7, we went to Rolex for cross country day. Custom Made had been retired, and he was there at Rolex to meet his fan. (I believe the O'Connors were signing autographs also, but not when we were there). Tailor was in a portable corral with a tent over it--probably 20 x 25 feet. His fans were allowed to come up to one side of the fence. My children, wildly excited, reached down and pulled up handfuls of grass, and held them out to him. He walked over, looked my son straight in the eye, and gently ate the grass from my son's hand. Then he stepped sideways, looked my daughter in the eye, and ate the grass from her hand. Then he paused and looked me in the eye. I had the oddest sense that if he could have, he would have shook my hand. The people beside me, imitating my children, offered him grass, and Tailor did the same thing for each of them--stopped, looked, ate the grass--all down the row. Which was when I realized he was standing on grass--he could have been grazing with his butt towards us, but instead he was acknowledging his fans.
As an aside, it started raining hard at lunchtime, but my son was an enormous fan of Bruce Davidson's and refused to leave until he'd seen Little Tricky ride. We were therefore 3 of the 7 people still at the Head of the Lake to see Bruce and Tricky come through like it was some kind of equitation class, easy-peasy and Bruce grinning from ear to ear.