More from Brookberry Farm (The stables are aka Redtail Ridge)

I took these over at Brookberry Stables, known to most as Cozy Fox Farm and now renamed Redtail Ridge under new management. As I mentioned in my short memoir that I posted along with my slide show, I learned how to ride horses as a boy among other things. The smell of the horses, the way they gently rest their head on my shoulder, the curious twitch of the ears and the inquisitive snort as they smell your hand hoping for an apple or carrot. There really are no other animals like them. My first pony at age 6 or so was a Shetland named Sharon. She was all of maybe four feet high and she HATED me (all humans actually). Our first outing together, she took off at full cantor and if it weren't for the fact that we were in an indoor ring, we could very well still be sprinting off somewhere. Then came Corn Pone - a normal sized pony, white with black speckles. He was great except for the fact that he could not/would not stop eating. I could not take him on trail rides because he would stop and graze and short of beating him half to death, nothing would get him to get moving again. Lastly, I had Periwinkle. We found her in field in Kernersville and she was perfect. We rode and showed up and down the east coast until I was 12 and left home for boarding school. She was sold to a family in Connecticut. The young woman was clearly destined to have her as she went on to win at Madison Square Garden every year up until she retired. They actually had the ceremony at MSG after her final win. I have very fond memories of those days and I regret to say that I have not been on horseback since I was 16. Sometimes it seems I was living another person's life back then. It's kind of like remembering a great movie - you are glad to have seen it, wish you could recapture it, but know that you can't.