I Finally Realized I Am The Old Woman
By Sue Van Der Linden
Charlie Brown and I went to a horse show last weekend. It was a schooling show — very low key, with a generous crew that didn’t get nasty when dressage ran late, and a hostess who was truly in it to give everyone a good experience. We did the Elementary division, which was one level above Introductory, and one level below Beginner Novice.
I got there before my trainer and her wife, who were my ground crew for the day. As I made my way to the check-in desk, I noticed the other competitors. Many of them were young. Really young. Young enough to be my children. Yikes! But here I was, competing against these other riders who were so much younger than I am. What business did I have riding against these relative “children”? I’d have no chance of doing well against these nimble, fit, and agile youngsters, right? Should I adjust my goal to be “just don’t fall off!”? Or should I just scrap all that garbage, and go out for a fun ride across the fields on my boy?
I’ve never really been bothered by age. After all, it’s just a number. And I think your age is more in your attitude than anything. Plus, I ride with people a lot younger than me all the time at home. Why would a show be any different? So I decided to forget about the rest of the riders, and just focus on us. I made my question of the day, “What do I need to do for Charlie to make this an amazing ride?”.
We laid down a good, solid dressage test. Yes, there were a few bobbles, but I knew exactly where they were. In a way, I didn’t care what we scored, because our victory was in the doing. We were the last pair to run the show jumping course in our division. Then we milked all the break time we could on the way out to cross country — 14 jumps over expansive fields, and rolling terrain. We both finished in good humor. All in all, our rides weren’t perfect. But they were what we needed that day.
As we headed back to the trailer, we stopped at the check-in desk to return our pinny, and pick up our scores, it finally dawned on me — I AM the old woman! And that’s alright! In spite of all the mass media messages telling me I’m no good unless I’m 21, there are plenty of great role models in the riding world for me. Phillip Dutton just won an Olympic bronze medal at age 52. Bunny Sexton did her first Kentucky at age 51. I have no delusions about me going to the Olympics or Kentucky! But if Phillip and Bunny can accomplish those feats in their early 50s, then my goals at Beginner Novice and Novice become much more achieveable.
At the end of the day, Charlie Brown and I had accomplished a score of 34 in dressage, a clean show jumping round, and 20 penalties on cross country. But even with that, we finished in 5th place out of 21 competitors. Not bad, especially considering I was probably the oldest rider in the division. It felt good to compete against other riders, regardless of age (theirs or mine), and come out well. The age factor thing was just icing on my cake.
That said, I am rather looking forward to competing in the USEA shows that recognize my “Master” status. OK, the cat’s out of the bag! If you’ve read the USEA rule book, you know that Master status means I’m over 40. Truth be told, I’m 50. But I feel like I’m 30. So I’ll be damned if that number is going to get in the way of doing the things I want to do with Charlie Brown. I just feel like I get my own special category now.