Post script

I have had a long chat with Superhubby about Jazz. He, of course, sees what is on his face when we are jumping and I don't. He tells me that he looks puzzled and confused when we jump more than 2ft 9, but he seems to be OK with 2 ft 11 in a showjumping arena over fences he's already done once at 2ft 9. He says that he is nothing like Jack, who simply used to look malevolent a lot of the time and who never agreed to do flatwork consistently either, whereas Jazz does that happily until he gets tired. He said that my second round yesterday looked much more fluent than my description of how it felt - he couldn't see anything wrong with most of it. He's convinced that it's just a matter of time and experience before Jazz learns that jumping is actually fun.

In fact, we came to the conclusion that if Jazz was a six-pack, we had no coke at all when we started. And that over the last 8 months we have got hold of six tins and filled them one by one with coke (we're not sure yet if it's diet or full-fat; cherry, vanilla or classic). We've got all the bits in place, and all we are missing now is that little plasticky thingy that holds the six of them together before we have a completed article to stack on the shelf :-)

In other words, SH is convinced that any time now the penny will drop and Jazz will put all his learning together and be ready to do some sensible jumping competitions. He thinks it could be months, but seems equally sure that it won't be years.

I hope he's right. He was wrong about Tia (he didn't want me to buy her and she turned out a diamond pony) and he wasn't convinced that Tetley was as talented as I thought he was, but he's been pretty much spot on with his analysis of my horses for the last few years. So let's hope he's got it right this time.

Meanwhile, although my own mental state could have benefitted from a bit of eventing this summer, I'm focussing on Jazz's plusses, which are:

• he has picked the summer of summers to be missing events. Most of them have been rained off anyway!
• he is progressing every week, just much slower than I would have wished for and much slower than I have experienced before. But he does learn, and the learning sticks now from one lesson to the next.
• he is a truly fantastic athlete with superb biomechanical effectiveness.
• he turns heads everywhere we go as soon as he moves.
• he has such a gorgeous character that you can't help loving him anyway.

Anyone who knows where I can get hold of that last little bit of plastic to hold all his bits together let me know :-)

C