Snow, Dressage Tears, and Camp Dates

It snowed last night. Stupid snow. I'm not supposed to be here right now. Katchi and I are supposed to be working our tails off, hearing Silva Martin's German-Australian accent say "I know it's hard, but stay with him, keep asking for more, sit down, bigger trot, keep going...." But our last winter training day with Silva was cancelled. I don't think we'll be able to work with her again until April. I cried. Yep, that's right folks - I shed tears over a cancelled dressage lesson - who does that?! Then I opened a bottle of wine and ate a piece of fudge - I skipped out on my nightly Pilate's routine - I didn't feel any better. It's hard to explain just how much I look forward to my lesson days with Silva. They are tremendously hard, amazingly gratifying, totally hilarious, and a wonderful escape from the reality of my "real" life of work, deadlines, and traffic. I look desperately forward to them from the moment they are scheduled. It's good to love something in your life that much - to have passion about something. It's amazing to me how many people have nothing at all in their life that they love as much as I love my dressage lessons with Silva! So, yes, I admit to a few tears when I got the news that today's big day was cancelled.

So instead of posting videos of Katchi and me showing off our ten-meter canter circles (okay, maybe 11 meter - trying not to be the girl who runs over Silva Martin who is standing just barely safely at 12 meters!) and work towards enough balance for the counter-canters required in both Prelim and 2nd level tests... how do you feel about dressage featured in gangsta-rap?! As much as I love dressage, it's just too easy to make fun of!



As consolation to my dressage depression, I woke up to an email from my mom this morning - she and I have been stalking Phillip Dutton's website, waiting for the announcement of the 2011 camp dates! She found them first - posted last night (I know, because they were not there yesterday morning, afternoon, or evening when I checked!) - I think my mom's already booking her plane tickets to come out from California to be a camper's groom!

So - mark your calendars - the 2011 Phillip Dutton Camp is June 12-17. More info will be on Phillip's camp page soon. I certainly don't want to get so many people interested in the camp that I don't get a spot, but it really is an amazing experience, especially for those of us who are not fortunate enough to focus on our riding and horses all day because things like office jobs monopolize 8 hours or more a day. To be immersed in a training facility such as Phillip's for 5 days, without splitting your focus between horses, work, and other responsibilities - it's amazing the progress that can be made in such a short time of intensive training. Here's the link to my 2009 blog "Cherie and Katchi Get Duttonized" and my recent post about getting "re-duttonized" at his 2-day clinic last November (I was SO excited when this post got a nod from Eventing Nation!). With 2 new saddles and a new trailer purchased in 2010, I had to sit out the 2010 camp. It just about broke my heart when I ran into Jennie Brannigan and some fellow 2009 campers the weekend after the 2010 camp and they were full of laughs and stories from the week's events - I called my mom that night and said, we're going back to camp in 2011! I just can't bear to miss it!