First Week

Well, I'm falling behind already. I've been working at my new arrangement for two weeks now, and have a lot of news. This post will be exclusively about the first week, and I will continue to update soon (hopefully), with simple notes on saddle fitting, comparisons between my situation and 'real' working student jobs, and a post on politics and drama.

My first week at The Barn was atypical for two reasons that do not affect my Real Job. The schools were having a day off on Monday, and there was some considerable snowfall and fear of snowfall on Wednesday and Thursday.

Growing up, my mother stayed home with my sisters and me, and could take care of us at home when school was out. For a lot of families, the kids have to go somewhere when the schools close. To this end, The Barn hosts “Day at the Barn” camps, which provides day-care for the younger kids, and employment for the day for the older kids. There wasn't quite enough help from the older kids this day, so I helped lead horses around in lessons as small children (who can't really steer) learned to ride them.

“Day at the Barn” may seem like it has nothing to do with the care and keeping of horses (and therefore doesn't belong on this blog), but providing care for children during the day while their parents are both at work is part of the way barns like this one make money.

On Wednesday, The Barn was closed. I didn't know this, and showed up unnecessarily after my short day at my Real Job. I did a little prep for the evening work, but left about 5 hours early. Thursday The Barn was closed again, and I didn't go in.

Inaugural

Here we go.


In November of 2010, I decided I wanted to spend more of my time working with horses. Back as far as high school I was seriously considering some equine-industry career, but I settled on computer programming in the hopes of becoming a video game designer. Then the recession and associated hiring freezes happened as I was graduating from college, so I came to Maryland as a telecom programmer instead.


Since November, I've put things in order. I prepped new health insurance, talked things over with my prospective future employers at The Barn, decided I would just have to lose dental insurance, and finally on January 3^rd, 2011, I asked my employer at my Real Job if I could work for them part time. My employer was amazingly supportive of my request, and today, the 24^th of January, I'm starting my new routine.


This blog is about being an equine working student, since the last time I looked for a blog about the life of a working student I couldn't find one. I will write about my duties and the things I learn about the care, management, and training of horses. Probably I will deviate to talk about other things, but I'm hoping to mostly keep it to horses.


My goal is that someone I don't know personally will read and comment on the blog one day. I am hopeful, but have low expectations. Despite this goal, don't let the fact that I know you personally stop you from commenting! And even if you don't care about horses, if I know you personally and am likely to see you again in the next year you'd better be reading. I will quiz you.