Rick OK, today is September 3rd. And we're talking with Anya Cromie. Please tell us the name of your horse. 

Anya My horse's name is Rue de Rivoli. It's a famous street in France.  And I've had Rue a little over a year. So it's a new partnership. 

Rick How did you get started with horses? 

Anya Well, let's see. When I was in high school, my dad was riding with some friends and got bucked off and cracked some ribs, so I stood in for him on some rides and never stopped. After that, I just started trail riding and then doing lessons and went on to do eventing, jumping and all kinds of different stuff. 

I started late in life. Most people start, you know, as kids and I think I was probably about 16 when I started. 

Rick Where was this? 

Anya I was living in Cambridge. So we used to drive out every Sunday to Western Mass up by Worcester and I would only ride one day a week for four hour trail rides. And I got the bug. There was no turning back. I started doing lessons on the North Shore and, yeah, a very odd story of the city kid turned into a horse person. 

Rick Actually, we've talked to a lot of city kids who turned into horse people. It's not unusual.

Anya This is the third, fourth, fifth horse I've owned? I had my first horse that I shared with another girl when I was a teenager. And then I had my eventer. And then I took some time off. Later a friend of mine who had the six horses moved away and I acquired one of her horses who is now semi retired. And then through an interesting set of circumstances, Rue came into my life totally unexpected. So it was just good fortune, I guess.

Someone at the barn had heard about a horse that needed to be re-homed. And we all joked that someone said it was a Grand Prix dressage horse. And we said it's probably a 20 year old quarter horse standing in a field. We knew nothing about it. The barn owner, Linda, was going to look at it and she said, well, you'll come with me because you'll write anything. We made the introduction and we went over and it turned out to be through a fantastic North Shore woman, Meg Douglass Hamilton, who breeds wonderful horses and this mare was a fantastic horse that had just been living with her, not being used for many years. 

And she wanted her to get back to work and have a good home. So it was a great set of circumstances.

Rick Does Rue do anything that makes you laugh out loud? 

Anya Let's see. I suppose she has funny mannerisms. She's a very petite, fine girl. She always looks around the corners of her stall like she's a baby bird. She always does that. She has lots of quirky mannerisms. But I have to say, this is my first mare and she has a challenging personality. But I think when you earn that trust, we're still sort of figuring each other out. And it's a lot of fun. It's exciting. 

Rick Well, I have to say that I really enjoy the session, it was a very nice location up on the Hill. And we're about to go through all the pictures. 

Anya I can't wait. Thank you.