But we could have gotten a NICE three-year-old!

All of my horses have their own stories, how they came into my life. Midge's story is a little bit special, because unlike the others, he chose me before I chose him.

Midge's breeder, as I know the story, bred saddleseat-y horses, and had bred this Dutch Harness Horse colt with eyes on keeping him intact and putting him to Arab mares to make super flashy show horses, but had reservations as he grew up that his hind leg stepped too much under and not enough up and down. She decided to have him started like a sport horse, instead of a show horse, and sent him to a trainer I was working for in Chicago.

Midge was just barely under saddle when I came home from college (it was the summer of 05, between my junior and senior years). He was 15.2, downhill, upright, and spooky, spooky, spooky. He wasn't a bolter or a bucker. He'd just STOP. And I could be damn strong, but I couldn't kick him hard enough to get him out of that I'M NOT MOVING! place. So when I rode him the first few times, someone had to stand in the middle of the ring with a lunge whip in case he hit the brakes.

But he got started, and wasn't all that badly mannered for a rising 3-year-old stud colt. As I went back for my last year of school, the breeder/owner was debating whether to take him back home or to sell him. My work was done.

Fast forward to January 06. I haven't given so much as a thought to the little orange Dutch thing, when my mom calls me to tell me his breeder had passed away. Sad, I said. She said they're liquidating her herd of horses. Ok, I said. And she says, so I bought Victorious.

"Chhh," I say. "Why? If we wanted a three-year-old, we could have gone to Europe and gotten a NICE three-year-old."

"Look," she says, "he's got all that chrome, and that darling face, and those cute legs. I got him for a song. Take him to some horse shows, get him going, and flip him. A fun project for you."

"Ok," I say, "but you've got to geld him."

I graduate from college and come home, Billy and Ella, my fancy schmancy imports, in tow, and I go to see this little orange thing my mom took a gamble on. He's a gelding now, and he's coming four. He's taller. He still looks like a goober, but he's at least level. So I turn him out in our indoor.

Holy mother of pearl, the thing can freaking TROT.

Ok, I tell him. You have one year, and then you gotta go.

I showed him at Training Level and in a couple of Materiale classes. When he's not spooky, he wins everything. He doesn't come with me to Florida that winter, but he meets me at Pam's the next summer, now coming five and all the more physically grown up. Still very much a baby, and I show him at Training Level again that summer, to the same tune: when he's tight, he's awful, and when he's relaxed, he scores 75%s. And I put him up for sale.

Lots of interest. One in particular tries him a couple of times, loves him, and just as I'm within a few weeks of going to Virginia, the deal falls apart. I call my mom (who hasn't seen him in 6 months), and she's a little distressed, but we've got no choice - he's got to come home to VA with me.

She can't believe what he looks like when he walks off the trailer, and she REALLY can't believe what he looks like when he goes. She says, you know, I'm sort of falling in love with this horse. And I say, actually, I know exactly what you're talking about.

Midge is coming 7 now. I entered him in two shows last year at First Level, but never made it down centerline - we had some questionable farriery that took a few months to sort out, and by the time it did he was starting to school the changes and the upper-level lateral work, and I said screw it, let's wait until I can show him at a fun level. I've taken him through the Third-3 test a few times over the last few weeks (which is a damn hard test!), and it's all coming together. When he's relaxed, the judges will tell me to develop more swing and relaxation through the back, and when he's tight, the judges will tell me to develop more swing and relaxation through the back. He's not got the conformation for big, straight-legged extended work, but he's got an incredible dyanamicism to the collected work, and great talent for piaffe-passage. I have to work every day on making him less of a leg-mover and more of a back-mover, and I'll be working with that until the day he retires.

But he comes out of his stall every day eager to work, a firebreathing nut, and all I have to do is channel it. He's the only horse I get on who gives me a great ride every single day.

Needless to say, he's no longer for sale!