A New Neighbour (old friend)

Note that non-pony-sister is wearing my Toggi jacket. Isn’t it amazing the way your children jeer hurtfully at all your clothes, then borrow them immediately.

Clyde has a new neighbour. I recognised the little chap in the stall next door right off; he was roadtested by pony-girl in one of our pony-buying forays. Briefly, that is: she got on and off in the same minute. Here he is in my blog: The next to be led out was a skewbald cob, very pretty, like a stuffed toy with white-and-gold velour patches. "You’ll really feel the difference, this one’s done so much more!" She was dead right there, Bolshy’d done so much more he knew that whisking up his heels, rolling his eyes, and tossing his head like a stallion meant he got to go back to the stable even before the saddle warmed up.

Yep, that was Bolshy, and now he has arrived at NagsR’Us, on trial with a first-time owner like ourselves. I stood by his gate murmuring softly to him, sorry for him as he was nervously dancing on the spot with agitation at his new surroundings, for which kindness the little blighter rewarded me with a vicious lunge and a sharp nip. Clyde has taken an instant dislike to this pretty young upstart and was probably telepathically telling him to naff off back where he came. The other day when Clyde was tethered at the back of the stable, I had to lure Bolshy to the front of his stable gate and stuff polos into his snapping jaws to stop him annoying Clyde, but I lost the stuffing rhythm for one second and lo! there was Bolshy’s cheeky face poking round a gap at the back of the stable, going nya nya and boldly taunting our old grumpychops, who lunged at him with ears flat back and teeth bared. One more inch and he would have ripped off Bolshy’s perky patchwork ears and spat them out contemptuously like a mouldy carrot.

I have a nose for unsuitable horses and my prediction is that Bolshy will be gone long before the trial month is up. But we shall see. After all, not everyone has perfected wimpiness to the degree we have achieved. Aircraft are a problem in this area as we are apparently under a flightpath for fighter training missions, and the planes, sleek dark arrows of death, roar overhead like rockets and are gone in an instant, leaving nervy throughbreds scattering round the school in panic with shrieking riders clinging to their necks. One passed over the topschool the other day and Pony-girl was off Clyde’s back in a flash - “that’s it, I’m taking him back, it’s dangerous!” “But – but!” I stammered, looking at Clyde, who was standing there unconcerned, his long lashes lowered and his eyes soft with some distant inner contemplation. “Clyde’s fine darling, he isn’t scared!”

“But I am,” PG darkly muttered.