Something wonderful for a change

["Maryanne Stroud Gabbani" <maryanne@ratbusters.net>]

It seems to me that most of my news for the past year or so has been
disasters....even when they were fairly funny disasters like our May race.
But finally something really good happened to me. Last October, my Arab
mare, Dorika broke a sesamoid playing around in the desert with her Dutch
warmblood boyfriend Oscar. Luckily for her, our American vet happened to be
around, xrayed and diagnosed right away before I had a chance to mistakenly
cause any more problems. When he gave me the verdict, I cried for two days
straight. I've had this mare over 10 years now and she's the reason I became
interested in endurance. She had about 6 months of serious rest, box,
handwalk, and small paddocks where she couldn't run, before we were given
the ok to ride out on hard ground last spring. Having to ride her in the
agricultural areas rather than the desert opened a new world of riding for
not just Dory and I, but a lot of our local riders. People here had stopped
riding around the farms and stuck just to the desert, but if they wanted to
ride with me, it had to be the farms. In the process, we discovered miles of
wonderful trails along canals, dirt roads, and villages. And the farmers and
villagers are now used to seeing us pass and no longer treat us like
Martians.

Jack just went back to the US yesterday. On this trip he xrayed Dory's
sesamoid and did an ultrasound on her tendon. Verdict? Other than some old
scarring on the tendon (she hurt it a year before the sesamoid), she's 100%
sound. Ever seen a short, well-rounded 51 yr old woman doing a victory
dance? A sight to be seen only once or twice, I'm sure.

Last night I took Dory out to the desert for the first time in a year to
start her walking in sand for her muscles. I've never seen a horse so happy
to be in the desert! Her eyes were big as saucers and she felt like a barrel
of dynamite. At one point, she danced so much that all the other horses with
us got excited and started galloping, at which point she took off too.
Idiot! That was how she broke it in the first place. But she was fine, and
spent the rest of the time jigging happily and trying to convince me that
she could gallop forever...didn't work though. I've ridden a lot of other
horses during the year, but nothing was like taking my girl back to the
desert she loves so much. Now just to convince her to take it a little easy.
<G> Now to get Bunduq healed up, which will take about 4-5 months and I will
have 3 sound horses, and a colt on the way, as Nazeer turns 3 soon. I may or
may not ever be able to compete with Dory, but just to be able to go out in
the desert again with her is enough.

Maryanne Stroud Gabbani
Cairo, Egypt
gabbani@starnet.com.eg
www.ratbusters.net