Chancey of the Maury River

by Gigi Amateau

  Though no one had offered any hope of improved vision in my left eye, all believed that with aggressive treatment, the remaining vision in my right eye could be preserved for some time. We would need to prepare for a lifetime of surgeries to remove any future carcinomas should they return, as Doctor Russ predicted. To have the malignancies removed, I was to be transported away from the Maury River Stables, beyond the blue mountains and into another valley farther away, in Albemarle County, where cases such as mine were handled every day.

  It was an act of true compassion when Mother suggested that Mac accompany me to Albemarle. Claire did not want me to be alone. Mother consented to pay the trailer fee and all lodging costs for Mac to board with me at the hospital that was to save what remained of my sight. Mac gladly agreed to travel with me. I could think of no one besides Mac who would give me greater comfort, except of course Claire herself.

  Mother withdrew Claire from school on the day I left the blue mountains for my surgery. Claire did not seem afraid for me and of that I was glad. She spent the morning preparing us for our departure. Claire made a big fuss over Mac and me, grooming us both and treating us to more stud biscuits than was customary. Mrs. Maiden and Mother couldn’t help but fawn over us, too. Claire readied the trailer by mucking out dung from a previous trip, filling the hay nets with plenty of fresh hay, and stringing the nets side by side in the trailer, should we feel like eating along the way. When the trailer was ready for us, Claire clipped the lead rope to my halter and walked me inside. Mother followed behind with Mac.

  Claire had drawn a picture for me, too, which she had secured to the wall of the trailer. The drawing showed the peaks of Saddle Mountain grandly filling the page, with two friends standing in the saddle between the peaks. The friends — a girl and a horse — nuzzled each other face-to-face. Claire pointed out to me the shape of a heart rising between the two. Then she made Mrs. Maiden promise to keep the picture with me in my room at the hospital. Claire nuzzled me. “When you feel scared over there, just look at the picture and remember me and Saddle Mountain. We’ll be here when you come home.”

  Mother had wet eyes; Claire did not, but stood smiling and blowing me kisses until Mrs. Maiden shut the trailer windows, leaving only a sliver of light visible to me.

  Though I could only see slight glimpses of her, I could hear Claire running beside the trailer all the way down the drive. “Bye, Chancey! Bye, Mac! I love you both! Come back soon!” Claire’s words did not stumble once.

  I whinnied a loud good-bye and hoped she could hear me, too. I’m sure that Claire stood at the end of the drive waving at us until we were long out of sight. I did not have enough time to say a decent farewell to Claire and Saddle Mountain. The narrow road switched over and back onto itself, and soon nothing of Saddle Mountain was visible. I had lived every day of my life standing within sight of it. Even on the days when its peaks hid under a blanket of fog or behind a blinding white snowstorm, Saddle Mountain and I stood together.

  As Mrs. Maiden drove farther away from the Maury River Stables, I lost my breath and could not find it. For many miles, I strained to see something familiar out the window slot. My nervous bowels began to rumble. Mac nickered to me, “You’re okay, Old App. The mountain will be here when we return, and so will your girl.” I found my breath and sniffed Claire’s drawing of us; it still smelled of Claire.

  The surgery at Albemarle required only an overnight stay. Again my strong Appaloosa breeding aided me in recovering quickly. Of the surgery itself, I remember only that the nurses spoke very kindly to me just before I felt as if my legs had stopped working and I were going to fall down.

  Mac’s presence soothed me greatly, for when I first woke up from surgery, I could see nothing at all. The Belgian remained attentive, ready to explain the situation to me.

  I feared I would never see again. “Mac, everything is completely dark now. Has the surgery failed?”

  “No, friend. Your eyes are both heavily bandaged. I heard them say you’ll have the right eye; they don’t know about the left. But you will see Saddle Mountain and you will see Claire, very soon.”

  “Mac?” I asked. “Are you an old horse? You look very young indeed, but you seem older than I am at times. Are you old?”

  “Not very,” Mac replied. “The dentist says I’m eight.”

  “I think you are older than your teeth, Macadoo. How did that happen? What brought you to the Maury River Stables? Were you abandoned in a field, too?”

  “Get some rest, Old App. We’ll have plenty of time to talk when you’re well.”

  I did rest. Mac stood watch over me until Mrs. Maiden came to drive us back to the Maury River Stables. With bandages still on both eyes, I finally returned home. Claire greeted us at the gate, just exactly as she had promised she would.

  Upon my return, Claire threw herself enthusiastically into leading my recovery and treatment. Her concern for my comfort never waned; Claire remained as attentive to me as she had been from our first meeting. She checked with Mrs. Maiden to be sure that my medicine was administered properly. She took her role as my friend and caretaker very seriously, and as much as anything, I believe this is what eased my suffering. My eyes healed quickly, and soon enough Claire and I were ready to take our first lesson together, and indeed, our first ride, too.

  First Claire took extra time to stretch me, just as Mrs. Maiden had shown her. She leaned her small frame into me, lifted a foreleg at the cannon bone, and then ever so slowly stretched it out fully until I took the leg back from her. After completing each of my legs this way, Claire wrapped both her hands firmly around my tail, braced her legs, and pulled with all her strength. I, in turn, pulled my weight forward, until Claire released her hands.

  During our first lesson, we did not jump or practice dressage tests. Instead, Claire asked to practice our flatwork bareback. “I’ll feel Chancey’s rhythm better if I’m riding free, Mrs. Maiden.”

  Mrs. Maiden obliged, “Excellent, Claire! Riding bareback will strengthen your legs and core, too.”

  I, too, preferred carrying Claire without a saddle, as it was easier on my back and joints.

  In our first lesson, there was no guessing as to what would come next, or what was expected of the other. Claire asked for a working trot and a working trot I gave her, right away. Claire naturally rose to the trot precisely in time with my outside shoulder. She touched down lightly on my back and without the slightest bounce. Together we two moved in delightful tandem. Claire needed no stirrups, no saddle, no whip, or no spurs. Claire needed only to be Claire. I will say that for the entirety of our first ride I thought only of Claire and what she might ask of me next. I found a new energy, a new appreciation, and a new joy in riding with Claire.

  I kept my focus on Claire and tried to forget about the cancer in my eyes. Thanks to the skills of my Albemarle surgeons, my cancer had been halted for the time being. I maintained sight in my right eye, giving me a fair line of vision of nearly 180 degrees, as I had learned from Doctor Russ’s follow-up examination. I am faithful to the belief that, had my tumors been allowed to grow unchecked, I would have quickly succumbed to complete blindness. Though I could feel that the cancer remained hidden within me, I could also feel that it had been driven away for the present. In any event, our training had to take into consideration the near total darkness in my left eye.

  While neither Claire nor I were beginners, we knew we would have to work hard if we were ever to compete together. Most of my career as a school horse had been spent teaching novice riders only the very basic skills. By the time Claire and I joined, she was already an accomplished horsewoman, as she had learned to ride on Daisy. From the time she was five years old, as Mac relayed directly to me, Claire had spent as much time as possible with horses.

  For the first time in my twenty-two years, I felt a sense of purpose in training with one student devoted solely and only to me. Mrs. Maiden set for us a goal of showing in the late-summer series of local hunter shows. Though Clair
e and I were both experienced, Mrs. Maiden insisted that we start out together in the most elementary of classes — Short Stirrup Walk-Trot. With her undeniable talent for persuasive argument, Claire secured an accord with Mrs. Maiden that if we worked on our equitation without complaint, we could also compete in a jumper class over two small fences. With several months available to train, Claire and I were confident that we would be ready by the end of August.

  The focus to our training surpassed any lesson that I had given as a school horse. Claire had chosen me as her companion, and together we worked every day. With the new supplement arriving in my morning grain each day, I felt freer of pain than I had for some time. As Claire and I were not jumping too aggressively, I felt certain that I could tolerate well this degree of soreness and aches. Indeed, it would have been more painful to deny, to Claire or myself, the satisfaction of becoming a team.

  True, Claire and I were only jumping small eighteen-inch fences and, at most, a course of two outside lines. But it was a joy for me to be with Claire no matter what we were doing. We progressed easily from taking the little jumps at the trot to taking them at the canter.

  We quickly found that I needed to be very nearly completely retrained to jump. As a way of compensating for my poor eyesight, I had long refused or ducked out of jumps. As everyone now understood the reasoning, no one — not Mrs. Maiden, Mother, or Claire — seemed the least bit dissuaded from the effort it took to retrain me. My refusal behavior was treated as an entirely natural consequence of my visual impairment; no one accused me of a poor attitude or nasty temperament.

  The burden of retraining me fell primarily to Claire, under the guidance of Mrs. Maiden, and with the encouragement of Mother, who no longer kept up a pretense of reading or writing at the barn. In fact, Mother joined us in the ring by taking lessons, using Mac as her teacher. Mac rather enjoyed this phase of Mother’s. He is known to adore human females and is rather boastful of the fact that he has never, accidentally or with intent, allowed one to slip out of the saddle, even at times at his own peril. Mother and Mac got on sweetly. Though they did not train together as Claire and I did, they appeared to enjoy each other’s company, and Mother grew comfortable enough with Mac to call for the canter herself every now and then.

  The presence of Mac and Mother in the ring, along with Daisy and her new student, Ann, helped us prepare better for showing than if we had undertaken our training privately. As is sometimes the case with bossy mares, one must use extreme caution when approaching from behind. In Daisy’s case, she is hardwired to kick out behind her at the slightest detection of another horse. This posed no problem for Claire, or me, for Claire had years of experience as Daisy’s primary student. She was well informed of Daisy’s invisible bubble and the consequences of violating said bubble. Daisy herself gave off plenty of warning by pinning her ears flat back as soon as any horse even approached her. Daisy’s presence in the ring with us simulated the very conditions under which Claire and I would be competing, assuming I could be retrained to jump consistently and safely with Claire.

  To help me undo my bad jumping habits, Mrs. Maiden constructed several exercises. First, she began placing dollar bills between Claire’s calves and my barrel. Claire was then instructed to ride our entire lesson, even over jumps, without losing the bills from under her. This was necessary, explained Mrs. Maiden, because a strong leg is the best aid a rider has to communicate with her partner. Furthermore, Mrs. Maiden told us that in my case, Claire’s legs needed to compensate for my poor eyes.

  She said, “Claire, blind horses can compete in Grand Prix events, if they’re matched with the right person. Chancey’s not completely blind yet; there’s no reason he can’t do anything you ask him to do. You just have to consistently ask him. If you ask with your hands but not your legs, he’s going to have to guess what you mean. Sometimes he’s going to guess incorrectly. But if everything about you — your eyes, your legs, your hands, your heart — are telling him the same thing, then it’s just as if you were talking to him, like I’m talking to you now. So we’ll work on your legs first.”

  Claire picked up the reins and held the dollar bill tightly against my barrel. For a girl her age and size, Claire already possessed a strong leg; the dollar-bill game only added to her strength.

  Mrs. Maiden also had Claire count our strides out loud on the approach of every jump. Beginning about six strides out, Claire would count us over the jump. “One, two, one, two, one, two, jump!” This was begun entirely as a finishing technique for Claire, but we all soon realized that hearing her helped me compensate for my shortcomings. In our training, I learned to keep my ears turning always toward Claire’s voice, readying myself for her cues.

  “Trot, Chancey, trot!” Claire invited me.

  For most of my life, it had been fundamentally contrary to my philosophy to respond to voice commands only, except for the command whoa, which I had taken quite seriously. I suppose one of the characteristics that had contributed to my reputation as an obstinate horse was that I required much more of my students than the simple voice command to walk, trot, or canter.

  I firmly believe that children don’t learn well on push-button ponies, or automatic horses, and so I myself had always determined not to be automatic in any way. Children deserve to learn the basics upon which a strong foundation is built, and that cannot be done through voice command alone, in my humble opinion.

  But Claire was different. In working with Claire, I did not feel I was giving her lessons, but learning to move with her as if we were a single being.

  “Trot, Chancey,” she said again. I obliged. I picked up, and held, an easy trot while Claire performed around-the-world by turning herself around and around in the saddle while I circled the entire ring at the trot.

  “And, whoa,” Claire sang as she directed me toward Mrs. Maiden, who was still standing in the ring.

  A barn mother, watching from the fence, yelled, “He’s gorgeous. He doesn’t even look like the same horse; his coat is so shiny. They look beautiful together.” Claire and I came to rest with Claire sitting backward in the saddle. Mrs. Maiden got back to the lesson.

  “Okay, Claire, enough play. Let’s practice the outside line.”

  We worked hard to correct my bad jumping habits in time for the summer series. Claire’s strong legs became most important to our training. Mrs. Maiden worked us both hard, always pushing us each to do our best individually and to do our best as a team. She liked to pull us into the center of the ring for an explanation of the task before she set us loose to attack the jumps.

  “Claire,” Mrs. Maiden would say, “you’ve got to hold him up with both legs. He’s not Daisy, remember? If you drop him, he’s going to want to duck out, but don’t let him. Don’t get ahead of Chancey, and don’t fall behind him. Use your legs to tell him when it’s time to jump. It’s almost like you’re going to lift him up with your legs, then hold him up the whole way over the fence. He’ll listen to you once he knows he can trust you. Remember, he can’t see out of that left eye. You’ve got to see for him.”

  I learned, with Claire, to wait for that moment where together we would defy gravity. We would canter around half of the ring, with Claire counting my strides on the approach. I felt what was coming from the shift in Claire’s weight and the tilt of her head. I felt when it was time to fly.

  Claire would rise up from her seat with just enough spring. Steady with her entire leg, and with both of us looking far beyond the fence into the mountains, we would hover for an eternal instant. Once over the jump, Claire would always laugh out loud, delighting in the thrill of jumping with me. She held me straight, and cantering away from the first fence, we would soar, again, over the second fence in the line. We touched the ground, rounded the corner, and again and again we flew over the two small fences, each time with less effort and more lift. During those early days of jumping with Claire, I felt that if I had wings, they would be named Claire.

  We progressed rapidly together. My
desire to be a great first horse for Claire, combined with my stubborn insistence that arthritis and blindness were mere annoyances, meant that sometimes I pushed myself too far.

  Once, after an outside line, Claire reached down and patted my neck, just as she usually did after a clear round. “Let’s go again, Chance.”

  I was already tired and breathing heavily. I didn’t want to go again. I wanted Claire to take off the saddle and let me graze in my field while she rested on my back. I preferred to watch the sun set while listening to Claire practice her choir songs. Yet for as much refusing as I had done in the past, I could not refuse Claire. She asked for the canter, and I stumbled.

  “Claire,” Mrs. Maiden warned, “Chancey’s worked hard today. Why don’t you walk him down to the barn? You can jump again tomorrow.”

  Claire’s confidence was back; she wanted to jump all night.

  “Please, Mrs. Maiden? We’re just getting the hang of it together, and I haven’t ridden like this in such a long time,” Claire begged. “Just one more outside line? Then we’ll stop.”

  Just as I had, Mrs. Maiden also had difficulty refusing Claire. She gave in. “Okay, one more line. Take your time and use your aids; Chancey’s tired.”

  Claire asked for the canter again. This time, I threw my weight into her request, getting the correct lead despite feeling sore and exhausted. Claire counted on our approach and gave me equal support with both legs.

  I was not the only one who was tired and needing to rest. I felt Claire’s legs evenly on my sides, but then on the approach, she looked away and dropped her right leg. She opened the door for me to duck; I thought I was supposed to go out and so I relaxed, sure that Claire had changed her mind about the prudence of taking these last two fences. I did not expect her to come up into jump position, but she rose into her two-point, ready to jump. I tried to stop myself, but it was too late. I ducked out to the right.