My Granny Perth was taken into hospital on the 12th January, the day my Granny Dunblane passed away. My Granny Perth passed away yesterday, she too was 94 years old. There was 34 days in age between them. For the past 2 and a half weeks I have been divided between sadness, worry and hope, there was part of me that thought they both wouldn't leave us. Now I have the great weight again, the effort it takes to just walk. I've been here before and it feels too soon to be back again. I wasn't ready and I'm not strong. I rode Wolfie yesterday, first ride of 2012. We didn't do much, just walked around the yard, but he was brilliant. My weight stayed at the mounting block and riding around, I felt light, my heart felt light. As soon as I got off and my feet touched the ground, my concrete boots were back on and I walked slowly. It was dusk when I got on so I didn't want to leave the yard. J was going out for a quick hack. Wolfie thought he was going with him and bounced over to the gate. We weren't going, so I turned Wolfie to walk back along to his stable and he threw a bit of a strop and started napping. Most horses, if they are going to nap, will do it on asking them to leave the yard to go out, Wolfie was napping because he wasn't getting to go out on the hack. He seemed genuinely pleased to have his tack on. I just need 20 minutes a night for the next week to get him out riding and then his fittening could really begin. I want to ride, I want to feel better.

Wolfie has a duck pond in his field at the moment. He is constantly in wading around in it and the ducks just carry on quacking and swimming around.

Mark Rashid is coming to Scotland in May to carry out clinics over 4 weekends. He (along with Monty Roberts) are the two horsemen / trainers who I admire most and find most inspirational and he is author of two of my favourite books, 'A Good Horse is Never a Bad Colour and Horses Never Lie'. It's the first time he has been in Scotland in 7 years and the clinics will be held at Ross Dhu Equestrian Centre in South Lanarkshire. Due to everything that has been going on, I hadn't caught up with my emails and my magazines and I only found out on the 21st January that the dates had been released. The closing date for applications was the 20th January. I would have moved heaven and earth to be able to take Wolfie to one of the weekend clinics. It's not cheap, £375.00 for the two days and also the cost of livery at the Equestrian Centre over night, but if that is all we managed to do all year it would have been worth it. The clinic can cover anything you want, whether it be remedial or schooling issues, but you can also work over fences or anything you want. I would have went, not to work on any real specific problems or issues, but just for the experience of working with Mark Rashid and having him share his opinions and what he thought of Wolfie. The fact that Ross Dhu is so close was just an added bonus. I emailed, but all the spaces have been filled. We are on a reserve list, so if anyone pulls out we may get a space. I'm not hoping that someone's horse goes lame, but things do happen, so maybe....