The zen of activity

When the world is too much with my level of indignation, as when Michael Chertoff gets up on his hind legs to prate about how we, by God, need another way to say, "Ihre Papieren, bitte," to potential terrorists and anyone who doesn't look sufficiently anglo, or when the White House deals with Jose Padilla's verdict by announcing Jenna's engagement, I am glad to have physical action in my life. John M. Ford's advice about dealing with stress--"Find a distraction and allow it to distract you"--is straight to the point.

I was the only student at last night's dressage class, so I got a serious workout; inside of ten minutes, sweat was trickling down my face and my legs were aching. Private lessons are great, because you don't have to keep tabs on other students and whether their horses are about to be unpredictable (or whether yours is going to be so in their flight space), you get lots of direct instructor feedback, and you can work on your weak spots. The downside is that you can't hide or slack or learn from other people's mistakes.

I was paired again with Cappi, a plump little Morgan. He's not a bad critter, but he's smart enough to have learned the trick of ducking out of a turn and running down the long side of a ring when he doesn't want to do something. Unfortunately for him, I am learning a trick known as not letting him do that. In a way, his spastic attacks are even helpful: I have to pay more attention to him and read his intentions, I damn well better be balanced on his back to handle his lateral moves, and I eventually have to be able to bring him back to wherever he might have freaked out and make him do the move correctly. Also, the adrenaline rush after he bolts down the ring, maybe veering a little too close to a pile of jump standards ("Not the face! Not the face!"), clears the nervous system out a treat.

To balance out the inevitable "whoa, about to die" moments of excitement, there are the long stretches of hanging out the horses in the barn. You still have to be careful, because they're still large skittish prey animals with big teeth and feet, but within those limits it's possible to decompress a lot. Contact with a large relaxed animal, just leaning into a shoulder and maybe giving them a good scratch along the neck where they can't reach, is very good for the blood pressure.

Orrr you can go home and attack the chilly peach army using strategy e-mailed from a friend. It's like Sun Tzu, only with more brown sugar and almonds!