Competence…

[jen judkins]

I don’t really know how you know when you graduate from being a newbie ‘driver’ to a bonafide ‘teamster’, nor have I any real idea of where I am on the journey to the title. I know how people learn though…

unconscious incompetence….you have no idea what you don’t know or how to do it.

conscious incompetence….when you realize how much you don’t know.

conscious competence….now you’re actually doing it…but you have to think hard about what comes next.

unconscious competence…when it all comes naturally without much thought.

For the past week or so I have been making a serious effort to get Reno out everyday, even if after work, and do something with him. We’re planning on going out to Shelburne Farms for the GMDHA plowing bee in a couple of weeks and since I don’t have a plow, I’m triing to be creative and do stuff that a.) is moderately strenuous, at least for short bits and b.) connects us more as a team. I have lots of spring cleaning and moving to do, so we started by moving some sheds, then a cast iron stove. I made a small sled out of an old decrepid wheel barrow to move rocks for the new goat pen (goats love rocks to climb on:D). Some nights we just go for a trail drive in the cart.

Anyway, tonight I decided on a task that would involve some stradegy, timing and would test our skills at maneuvering in tight spaces. I have a single round bale of hay, stuck back in the barn at the end of my main aisleway. The task was to get the bale out of the barn without hitting anything (the aisle way is lined with benches, tack and a brooder full of week old chicks:confused:) and then dragging it down to the new goat pen. I don’t have a sled big enough for the bale, so I just wrapped the sucker with chains. We did good getting down the aisleway, slow and steady, until we hit a rubber mat near the door and it started to slide with the bale. It was just enough noise to startle Reno and he surged forward. Of course, our slow, precise progress was now briefly a flail and the bale hit the doorjam, creating even more excitement and Reno really left. I nearly had him back under control, when I lost a rein. At that moment the chains lost their grip on the bale and hit the barn door with a huge crack, Reno pulled the other rein out of my hand and took off down the hill…chains and single tree dragging behind him. He ran about 100 yards and finally stopped as I yelled ‘whoa’ for the second time. He waited for me to come untangle his chains and we circled the house back to the barn and reorganized. I rigged up the bale once again and backed him up and hitched him on and off we went down to the goat paddock successfully.

As I was cleaning up the mess we made, later, I realized that I could not have done that 6 months ago. I mean I definately could have been stupid enough to hitch him to a bale of hay in the barn and have a wreck. But to control the result, remain calm, and proceed with the task at hand without anxiety…well its a real step forward.

Anyway, I really like this new diary section. It will be fun to come back in a year and read all this stupid stuff!

[Carl Russell]

Jen, what a good story. It brought me back to 1986. First horse. Been skidding wood for a couple of months. Unhitched and started a saw to cut up the log. He took off with evener bouncing off his heels, and ran right past the barn and into the woods on the other side of the driveway. I remember that feeling, of surprise, and yet it was more than that too, a sense of resolve. I picked up the lines and went back to work.

I like your progression of how people learn, but I’ll tell you that 24 years later I still find situations where I just have to shake off the surprise, and muster up the resolve. I know a lot, but that in no way is a measure of what I don’t know.

Happy trails… or is that trials? Carl

[Andre]

You brought him back and finished the job. I as well don’t know when the “teamster” badge or scar gets attached. But I would be happy to stand next to you if we ever make it! Great Job! (If any good hand says they have never dropped a line……You know the rest)

[mitchmaine]

hey jen, good goin’. did you ever think maybe that when things go according to plan, that you are only confirming your teachers words, and thats great, but when something happens unexpected, good or bad, it goes right up on the chalkboard as a life experience, a real event that you own, and that becomes the real “learning”. maybe there is a fifth level to your list and the last step is enlightenment or something and only happens just as you die. the light comes on and you say ” oh yeah, now i get it”. if carl’s right and i think he is that we are never done learning and the next experience is just waiting up around the next bend, then that makes this a worthwhile cause, right?

[Theloggerswife]

I remember when I hitched my team up to the ground driven tedder for the first time…..When we started off and that old tedder was click-clacking behind us, it wasn’t pretty for a little while. The old worn out leather harness that came with the horses broke and then I didn’t have control of one horse. One thought he had the green light and the other one knew I wanted them to stand while I cleaned out my underwear!!! 😮

I was encouraged by a friend to continue. He rigged up my broken harness and I ended up tedding hay until dark that night. If anyone has worked with horses, they have been in your shoes last night a time or two….

[Michel Boulay]

Hi Jen,
well reading your story last night I knew right away how you felt. I had my first wreck two days ago.
Couldn’t do much for the past two weeks, snow melting couldn’t use the bobsled anymore and all the spring weather= mud rain….. So this week with the beautiful weather we got, I decided to ground drive Gena and put some time driving. I have this tractor tire that was in her paddock doing noting and that I was contemplating for a while hooking her up to it. So I hooked it up with a chain and singletree and got it ready for her. Ground drove her a couple of times around her paddock, then pulled up to the tire back her up and hooked the traces to the singletree, everything was going good. Gave a kiss and off we went. She tried to go faster then a walk but I had her under control. Went up the hill and thought well I’ll drive over the piles of manure to spread them out for a couple of turns and then unhitch and ground drive again and call it a day.

All was going well, when we started to go down the hill, not very steep a gradual descent maybe sixty feet long, she started to walk faster and faster and then a trot while I was pulling on the reins saying walk and then whoa, noting seem to work until I had to let go. Well I caught up to her said whoa and she finally stop. That is after she went through the fence twice, the tire hit one of the post and broke it, the tire unhooked and she got tangled in the singletree, all that while running around for a good hundred yard or more and I running and trying to get a hold of her.
So I untangled the singletree and unhooked her on one side but the other side I couldn’t get the trace chain out of the hook. So ground drove her to the barn with the singletree dragging, tied her up got a large screw driver prided the hook got the singletree free put it aside hooked the chain on the harness. So with that sense of resolve like you said Carl, untied her and went ground driving her in the paddock before getting back to the barn and start unharnessing her. She had worked up a good sweat. She ground drove with the singletree dragging and in the paddock with no trouble. While keeping her tied in the barn I went out and fixed everything up before letting her out.

What an experience, hope it does not happen again but like a fellow horseman told me “expect the unexpected”.

Well that really discouraged me. But I told myself tomorrow wich was yesterday, I ‘ll harness her and go ground driving, which I did and everything went well. At the begining she always want to start fast but she calms down and everything goes good. I ground drive for a good mile or so before I unharness.

The learning never stops, we are always in knew situations. I know I will have to try the tire again or a log. Will have somebody with me next time. Tried to figure out what went wrong, nothing seemed to have spooked her? I put that tire back in the paddock, she knows what it is?

Right now working on a forecart, have a small scoot, with teflon on the runners, to hook her up to also.

Jen when I read your story last night and how you handle everything, it puts all what happen in to perspective. It brings out that sense of resolve that Carl mentioned.
Everybody have a nice day.

Mike

[Scott G]

I believe I have went full circle and have come back to #2 ( with qualifications). Every day that goes by I realize how much more there is to learn. Probably will be that way until the day I die. I hope it is, as life is a lot more enjoyable when you are open minded and continue to learn.

[jen judkins]

I guess I didn’t intend my four step plan to be linear….but circular;)….ever expanding our education.

Totally agreed, a happy person will learn something new on the day of their death.

[Joshua Kingsley]

It is always funny how and when things happen.
I have thought about what you said about the different areas of “enlightenment” and determined that I am in no way qualified in my mind to guess what level would be right, as every time I do somthing or look back on a situation I am thinking that I am doing this or that all wrong. There is always things to learn and I swear that if I were to live for the next 100 years I would never know all that one of the neighbors has forgotten over the years.

Tom is in his ninetys and still putting up hay. He still remembers how to do most anything with horses and has most of the origional equipment that he used over the years. Including some really nice Woods mowing machines and other stuff that still looks and runs like new.

Joshua

[mitchmaine]

hi joshua, where is tom, and does he talk to strangers? they are pretty much all gone over here. i don’t have to tell you this, but spend as much time as you have listening to him. what a resource you have there. envious, mitch

[Donn Hewes]

Nice Job Jenn, I think “getting back on the horse” can be hard right after a farm type incident. Obviously, when it can be done safely it is by far the best thing for the teamster and the horse, or horses.

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