Not the most graceless, although it came close. THAT was the time I tried to mount a lease horse bareback a few years back, got stuck partway up, gave a good ol’ heave and managed to fling myself off the other side.
THIS “fall”, I was riding my 4.5 year old Mustang coming off an almost 3 week layoff from pasture injury, just at a leisurely walk, when he decided to get “looky” about some rustling in a wooded area near the riding area. He’s normally fine, mind you, I just wasn’t quite sure if he might have a more dramatic response than usual to something if it turned out to be, like, the barn dogs flushing an armadillo, or a wild sow and piglets bursting through the brush and running squealing along the fence line. He’s been deeply concerned about the domestic pigs he’s met—if we’re ever attacked by a Dwarven army, I’m doomed as my cavalry mount will be in the next county. So I decided discretion was the better part of valour and when I noticed he was “looky” asked him to walk briskly in tangent to the woods, got his ears back on me, asked him to halt rather than letting him stop himself, and dismounted. Only I caught the edge of my safety vest on the saddle as I slid off, making me unbalanced, so I fell over and landed on my ass. Horse, thankfully, just looked at me like “what the heck is YOUR problem, it’s just a cat.” Rather than “OMG, it really IS THE APOCALYPSE” and taking off across the arena, dragging me along (since I probably would have been too dim to let go of the reins).
So now I’ve got a nice big bruise on my left buttcheek and generally a bit stiff because I was trying to be safe, whereas if I’d stayed on I might have been a bit jostled if he had decided to shy at the cat when it finally made itself clear. I’m just glad the barn crew guy out feeding didn’t see the event.
Graceless – slipped on the mounting block and found myself under my horse. Thankfully, he just turned his head around and looked at me with an expression that said “what the heck are you doing under there?!?”. Nothing hurt except my pride.
But my DH must have talked me up like I was great. So, I was riding a 4-year-old Argentine TB and we were jumping. Well, at an oxer that had lovely wishing-well standards, I got a bad distance. The horse popped it, and off I tumbled…rear end first…into the wishing well. According to my DH, all they could see was my helmet, and feet and hands sticking out of the well. And all I could hear is the two of them laughing their tails off at me. I’ll admit, I laughed, too, through the pain. I had a really good bruise and scrape about a foot long on my back. So embarrassing.
