Rappaport To The Rescue

It began with a free, probably Saddlebred, palomino named Trigger ridden up my parents’ driveway and given – saddle and all – to me by a departing member of the 4-H club where I was secretary. Which led to a regular 4-H Horse News column in my county newspaper and now, 2025 marks my 50th year with a published byline.

I have written for the U.S. Equestrian Team, 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games Committee, and interviewed such memorable figures as Linda Tellington-Jones and Dr. Temple Grandin for countless publications, plus serving as the voice for individual Olympic and World Champions like J. Michael Plumb and Chester Weber. On paper — at least — I ride one heck of a cross-country course or drive a four-in-hand through cones!

I do see the horse as our great equalizer. They mirror our holistic health and (fun fact) Olympic Equestrian really is one of the only sports where men and women compete equally. Gender? Does not matter. Age? Does not matter. Success depends on your partnership with your horse. If you open up to that partnership, to neither lead nor follow but to walk beside, the benefits are limitless. 

I interviewed a young woman born with ‘mermaid’ cerebral palsy, her legs clamped firmly together until they put her, as a toddler, atop a therapeutic center’s Clydesdale, where, to everyone’s shock, her legs parted, as if sitting on a horse was just what she’d been waiting for. Fifteen years later, she was on her university’s riding team.

Horses can do that. They allow us to open up – to life, to adventure and to ourselves. They allowed this upstate New York farm girl to carve out a career among her horse heroes, and hopefully pave the way for more generations of horse lovers to find even more opportunities on this side of the show ring, plus the confidence to believe that you never have to settle for a job when you can create your own avocation.

All it took for me to take aim at my future was a horse called Trigger.