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Pony Pals

Kathy Werner - Columnist
Posted 10/1/20

My granddaughter Adeline has been taking horseback riding lessons since this summer. She and her parents have been living up here in the country with me since March 13, leaving their home in …

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Pony Pals

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My granddaughter Adeline has been taking horseback riding lessons since this summer. She and her parents have been living up here in the country with me since March 13, leaving their home in Manhattan and working and doing school online.

During these Covid days, we were looking for something that Adeline could do safely and taking riding lessons fit the bill. Adeline has enjoyed riding her pony Lollipop, and, when I told my sisters, I heard all about their riding adventures when we were growing up in Callicoon. I never took riding lessons, but Laurie, Billie and Mary have lots of memories of their horse-riding days.

We had two horses--Daddy's Girl and Drummer Boy--stabled down at Slausenberg's barn on River Road. Bud Slausenberg was the music teacher at Delaware Valley Central School and the director for all our beloved musical extravaganzas. Bud's lovely daughter Kathy, in addition to playing the lead in many of these shows, was an experienced horsewoman and gave riding lessons to my sisters.

They do have lots of black and white photos of themselves on horseback, so I guess all the stories they've been telling me are true. The wildest story came from sister Billie who said some kind of rogue horse swam across the Delaware River and got her pony pregnant.

The resultant foal was sold. Sounds like the plot of a horse soap opera.

The girls rode and showed their ponies at the local horse shows. At one show Mary's pony was attacked by a persistent yellow jacket. Her pony took off, but she managed to hold on and get him stopped.

Laurie remembered the Equitation class for which she was a finalist at the Dutchess County Fair. The final two riders had to swap horses, to prove that they could control another mount.

Wild stuff.

Adeline's riding teachers are lovely, and her lessons alternate between trail rides and riding in the arena. That is after she cleans and saddles her pony, of course. She has been working on posting the trot and even cantered one day, though quite by accident.

I'm glad that this generation of the family has a new little horsewoman.

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