A thank you to my first pony - forever my soulmate by @bekkiwhitehead

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Buck was my one in a million.

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We met by the off chance, I had just started sharing my first pony with a friend at my childhood stables, Buck had been sitting doing nothing in the field for about a year, and his owner decided we might match.

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He was a green 5 year old 12.2hh Fell Pony X. His owner had previously rescued him off of a meat lorry, I imagine as he was too small for his breed, and too cheeky to be a kids pony.

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11 year old novice me fell in love with him as soon as I saw him. He was beautiful. The first time I took him on a ride it was clear we were meant to be, although he couldn’t canter further than a few strides, and I had to emergency dismount as he tried to roll on top of me!

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I had fallen head over heels in love with my pony of a life time and his many funny quirks. We learnt everything together, and he was ever so patient as I tried to get him over his first few jumps, but before we knew it he could canter around whole fields and we were jumping every log we could find out hacking.

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I will never understand how we got to where we did, as he’d never done anything except the odd hack, and I was practically a novice, straight out of a riding school. But we made it work.

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We had many ups and downs, but I always saw the funny side to his cheekiness; like bucking me off into a bush so he could run off to the nearest blade of grass, bolting across show grounds with me dangling on the end of the lead rope, breaking almost everything he was tied to (our yard owner used to curse at us both on a regular occasion) and rolling on me whenever the ground got slightly softer.

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Never losing hope, we built up such a strong bond and ended up competing in a few hunter trials, and we even took home a few first rosettes at local shows.

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I trusted him so much, we’d ride everywhere bareback, and jumping the biggest heights I’d ever done. It was 7 years before I eventually stopped riding him as I had to move away for my first job, and every day I regret not taking him with me, even if my legs did swing around his knees.

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I hope he’s out there terrorising more kids with his wicked sense of humour. .

Forever my soulmate,

Thank you for everything Mr B

xox