The school uniform

The summer holidays are over — and so is the eight-week boot-camp of a pony’s annual routine, says Catherine Austen. Roll on half-term...

PADDY heaves a sigh of relief. It’s 7.30am on a fine September morning and he’s just seen his small human, James, being loaded into the car wearing school uniform. Thank the Lord, thinks the Exmoor pony — the summer holidays are over.

First there was camp — that was quite fun but because Paddy was enjoying himself he behaved rather well, which precipitated a most unfortunate inclusion on the junior dressage and showjumping teams for the area qualifiers.

Despite Paddy doing his best to halt things there, he couldn’t persuade his fellow equine team-mates to misbehave — “Just a couple of bucks in the canter transitions, and snatch a bit of grass during the long-rein walk; nothing really bad,” he urged — and they qualified for some frightful championship.

That took about a week, then there was some schools’ showjumping competition before, finally, James insisted on going on hound exercise every morning during the final week of the holidays.

Paddy is one tired pony, but he is secretly quite proud of James, who was very wobbly when Paddy first arrived 18 months ago and whose mother used to have to pay £1 a go to persuade him to ride.

Paddy calculates the weeks until half-term and settles down for a long, peaceful graze. H&H

NEXT WEEK

The neck strap