The Fall, otherwise known as Calamity Carolyn and the Demon Mare

I flew through the air, landing with a silent but hard thud on tightly packed dirt and small gravel. My tail bone and the small of my back were the first things to hit the ground and my head was the last, but I remember the crack of the helmet as the base of my head collided with earth.

Looking up, I couldn't sit up, and the pain was horrendous, taking over my whole body. The day before I'd fallen too, the first time I'd ever done so, in the arena, luckily on soft soil. My pride was hurt more than anything and tears I could not stop rushed down my face. I got back on too, after he offered me a hug.

"I want you to get back on. That's the only way to not be scared."

Minutes later he would suggest I lope her, the she-demon as I would later call her. I did too, pressing my heel into her off-side, driving her nose into the corner and sitting my ass to the saddle, knowing she'd be keyed up and ready to leap into her remarkably fast stride, a controlled gallop.

Seconds before the trail ride, I'd decided to wear a helmet, a decision that would later save my life. My head hit the ground twice that day, both on hard packed ground, not the cushy embrace of arena soil.

Fifteen minutes after the she-demon took off, galloping at near 35 miles an hour, a creature with her own mind, one that could trip and fall hoof over head at any moment, I held on, keeping my seat and the back pockets of my jeans to the saddle. I rode that gallop well, but not prepared and too tired for her when she stopped abruptly, dropping her inside shoulder so I slipped off her side.

When I finally got up, my instinct was telling me not to get back in the saddle that day, but the women told me to get up on the "safe horse."

I surmise that his second girth strap prompted him to buck as the strap slid back into the soft and sensitive spot on his hind legs and belly. According to other eyewitness accounts, I held on to the saddle horn, absorbing each buck until he unseated me, I flew through the air and hit the hard ground, luckily with my head protected by a helmet.

All I remember is one second I was on him and the next I was mid-air, my brain flashing to navy blue and then black as I landed. Seconds later I looked up at the grey sky and tears fell as I was terrified a second strike to the back might render me paralyzed.

Twenty minutes and two falls later, I could not sit up, and fire paramedics braced my neck and back, getting me on a stretcher and into an ambulance as I was rushed off to Huntington Memorial.

Up until that point, I'd never been on morphine, and an hour after being on the pain killer drip, I hurled everything in my belly. I had an IV attached to me for a few hours, sat on a radiation bed for x-rays. Nothing was damaged, just a bruised tail bone. Just?

Since then I've done a lot, but I've never quite gotten over that fear. I'll never forget the first time I loped a horse; one of the most freeing things in the world. The closest to flying. Animal and animal communicating, velocity and wind combining to create a sense of freedom.

I've been in the saddle a few times since the accident, and I've loped too, but I always have the fear. It's like the naivete that exists before your heart is broken for the first time.

All I can say is I'm still here. Decisions have become increasingly heavy for me to make, each weighted so much more than they used to be. But, I'm still here. I am afraid but choose to move forward, and despite the falls I've ridden again.