Ever hopeful

Last sunday I went with my parents on a three and a half hour drive. Three and a half hours without a cigarette and only the vaguest idea of the route to our destination. The destination was an equestrian centre where my parents showjumper was jumping in a big competition. First a few things about the horse. He bought her in 2007 at Christmas and told nobody. Not me, not my mother and not my little brother. He bought her and brought her home to the farm and never mentioned her to anyone. Around the same time as he was taking delivery of a moody, neurotic three year old, I was being told by everyone in the village that I may just get a horse for Christmas. Christmas day comes and we're all up at the farm when Dad changes into his work clothes and asks me for help on the farm. So off we go to check the live stock and then he takes me up to feed the horses. He explained that he'd bought a horse for jumping but not to mention it to anyone as it was Christmas day. I agreed and then said 'Mum does know about the horse, though, right?'
'Of course she does,' he nodded.
So Christmas day continues without mention of the horse, although she was never far from my mind.

The day after boxing day, Mum, her dog and I went for a walk in some sort attempt to walk the indulgence of Christmas off in the bitter cold by the sea. She was saying something about the dog's name so I said 'oh well, you've got a horse to name now, so what names are you thinking of?'
'Horse?'
'Yeah, she's gorgeous, but what are you going to call her?'
'Horse?'
At this point I stopped and looked at her. 'Yeah, the horse, a mare about 17hh, grey, very pretty, up on the farm. That horse. Dad showed me her on Christmas day.'
'What horse are you on about?'
'Hold on here, are you telling me that you know nothing about this horse?'
After about ten minutes of complete disbelief from both sides, I told her what I knew about the mare. This is just an example of a typical Dad thing to do. We smile and nod and then try to pretend that the whole thing was our idea not his when it works out. Which it does more often than you would think natural.

So this year as a five year old, she went off to jump in this competition, and off we followed. When I got into the car to begin the journey, I asked about Katie, thinking that as none of us had ever been to the place before she might be the perfect companion. Katie is Dad's satnav, so called because apparently she just sounds like a Katie. But Katie was at home, resting in her box after about 4 uses in her entire life. I was slightly dubious at this but reassured myself with the idea that the place would be signposted. The first two and a half hourse were fine. We were all filled with hope that the horse would win and maybe end her season on a high. Dad doesn't want to over work her so she comes home for winter. She's coming home sometime soon.
It was when we were supposed to be about half an hour from our destination that the trouble began. Dad had gotten directions from a friend who had been there before and to his credit he had even written the directions down. What he didn't do was take them with him, claiming that he thought Mum had put them in her bag. She claimed complete ignorance of any directions. So out I got at filling station after filling station, doing that lost nonnative looking for directions run inside, and then the lost nonnative dejected shuffle back to the car when nobody had a clue what I was talking about. Eventually we found our way there but my hope of relying on signposts was both premature and dashed. At one point we drove around in circles looking for a signpost that Mum was insisting we had just neglected to see. It wasn't that we had neglected to see it, it just didn't exist.
After parking, we shuffled inside and found somewhere to watch our mare make us proud. After some thirty horses, she entered the ring and jumped a beautiful clear round. Or at least I think she jumped a beautiful clear round, I know she had a clear but I only managed to watch the first four jumps. Mum managed to watch five and Dad somehow got through the whole thing but he did say it was one of the few times in his life he'd ever been nervous. She knocked a pole in the second round and therefore being eliminated from the competition. She jumped really well apparently, but I didn't see it. I couldn't look. My pulse rate was raised, my mouth was dry and I felt like I was going to faint. I moved away from the rail and looked in the opposite direction. About five seconds after I had moved away, I felt someone stand beside me. I looked over and saw my mother looking slightly sheepish but examining the wall in front of her as if she was looking at the Mona Lisa.
So after three and a half hours in the car, two hours standing watching the competition, and two minutes watching our horse, we returned to the car. Nobody mentioned anything but trying to navigate our way out of the maze of roads that had led us there. Three hours later, (we were now old pros at the whole navigation bit and had included a stop for food) we arrived home. By this stage we were disappointed but not disheartened and had managed with varying degrees of success, in my case complete success and in Dad's case moderate success, to build the mare up again in our minds. Yes, she had had a disappointing round but she jumped well, she looked good and she had made it throught three qualifying rounds to get there. She had jumped amazingly in other big shows this year and she just had an off day. All in all, it wasn't a bad way to spend a sunday.