The Swinging
Pendulum: In Search of a Balanced Life with Horses
I
recently spent a morning rediscovering treasured belongings that have been mothballed and packed away in an old tack trunk for the past ten years. In the trunk, the custom- made show blankets in Lockton Farm’s
navy and royal blue, the immaculate white bandages and the brass fittings turned dull
with age, all have stories to tell. They represent some of my greatest memories: striving for excellence, a youthful sense of optimism, camaraderie, a sense of single-minded purpose and a shared direction with my peers. All of these memories feature my mother playing various roles as groom, driver, confidant and later, Nana chasing my first son Zack around horse trials in the southern United States. And yet this trunk full of beautiful memories has been
shelved under a set of stairs for ten long years. Anyone who has lived by Claude Thomas Bissell’s motto,
“Risk more than others think is safe. Care more than others think is wise. Dream more than others think is practical. Expect more than others think is possible,” will not be surprised to learn that my trunk also contains memories of great pain, risk and tumult. If you are a three day event rider, you might also expect to find death, catastrophic life- changing injuries and near bankruptcy lurking at the bottom of this musty, old trunk. The fact is, when you put yourself out on such a long and shaky limb in such a high risk sport, you open yourself up to such things. I have come face to face with different versions of this
harsh reality and left the sport twice to seek balance, yet despite all of that, I still found myself excitedly packing my old trunk for another fresh start.
Early Success & Heartbreak I was 25 years old and pregnant the first time the weight of this reality crashed down around me. Up to this point, I had been focused on my riding goals with blazing intensity and I was still naive enough to feel invincible. My beloved Young Rider mount O’Reilly and I had already logged an impressive number of miles for our tender years at CCI 3-star events in North America, Holland and England and had been named as spares for the 1992 Olympics. I was engaged to marry fellow eventer Mike
St.Denis, whom I had met at our Pony Club ‘A’ level exam seven years earlier. After five years of ‘just-
All photos courtesy Paige Lockton-Wilde By Paige Lockton-Wilde
friendship,’ I grew up enough to realize how amazing it was to be in love with my best friend, a remarkable man who matched my passion, shared my dreams and was indeed a very talented rider. Mike’s career was just
taking off, and when his only horse Holy Moses died of a massive infection, I gave him the ride on O’Reilly. I loved coaching him and we worked beautifully together. As a team, we were running a jumper farm for our employers, the Teichmans, developing young horses and also running a recognized horse trial at Mike’s family farm. Mike was placing consistently in his first series of Advanced level horse trials. The wedding invitations were sealed and addressed, awaiting delivery to riders from Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia. We had just discovered I was pregnant, and we were planning the final details of our outdoor wedding. On Friday, May fifth of 1995, just five days before Mike’s 3-star debut at Checkmate, he was kicked in the head by a young horse and the man I knew died. Actually, he didn’t die then and there. He clung to life with every fibre of his being, like only Mike could, and he survived against all odds. The person that emerged after a month in a coma, six months in hospital and another year of constant therapy,
Top to bottom: 1 & 2: Paige com- peting at Blenheim (U.K.) when she was young. 3: Mike
St.Denis riding Paige’s horse O’Reilly at Rolex Kentucky in 1995.
Warmbloods Today 33
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