 Kaitlyn
Dearth's Biography
One day when I was around three years old my parents and grandparents
took me to a horse show. My grandmother saw how much I loved
the horses and said, “She is going to be a horse back
rider when she grows up.” When I got older I enjoyed playing
with Barbie’s horse rather then her! At age nine I started
taking riding lessons. It was the greatest experience ever (by
the way, my grandmother was very pleased with herself when she
found out I started riding!) My first lesson went well. I rode
a pony named Buttercup. She soon became my favorite horse. After
a lot of, “what a good pony you are” and a couple
of carrots later, I was overjoyed when she literally started
walking me back to my car. When I looked over my shoulder to
see what she was doing I saw her following me! To this day I
still love horses. I remember telling my mom that I would gladly
clean stalls just to be around horses. When the opportunity
to volunteer at Personal Ponies came up I was thrilled. Next
I am going to write about how I came to work with Personal Ponies.
When I talked about nothing else but horses and my riding
lessons my best friend Mackenzie wanted to ride too! MacKenzie
saw an article in the newspaper about a nonprofit organization
that gave ponies away for free as a lifetime loan to the differently-abled
children of Massachusetts. The article asked for volunteers
to help out at the barn. The barn was a two minute drive from
our homes and in the summer we could walk there. Mackenzie
then asked me if I wanted to do volunteer with her. I almost
screamed “Yes, of course!” We then had our Moms
set up a day where we could go visit the ponies and meet Gineane
Haberlin, the State Director of Massachusetts. I also remembered
to fill my mom in on everything that I already knew about
Shetlands before she called Mrs. Haberlin. The day was set
for Thursday December 2, 2004. When we got there Mrs. Haberlin
came out, showed us around, and told us all about the ponies.
I can still remember going into the backyard and seeing four
friendly pony faces staring at me. I can remember thinking,
“The ponies must be saying,`okay, who are these new
people? I have never seen them before. Why is that one touching
me?’”
When we got home we made sure our Moms knew that every Thursday
we would be helping out at the barn! One day when Gineane
came down to the barn she had something in her hand. She gave
us each a piece of paper that read Personal Ponies of Massachusetts
Certificate of Appreciation. She then asked us if we would
like to become state coordinators for Personal Ponies - LTD
of MA? Mackenzie and I looked at each other trying not to
scream and startle the pony that we were grooming. In a gasp
we said, “yes” and continued to thank her. So
as I am writing this paper I am an honored state coordinator
for Personal Ponies - LTD of MA! I don’t remember much
else about that day, only running into my house telling every
one in my family a million times what my new title was. I
think I annoyed them, but they should be used to it because
every day I tell them something new that I learn about horses.
Because of this new job and responsibility Gineane and I correspond
a lot more (what would we do with out e-mail!) Mackenzie and
I go to the barn as often as we can.
This last section is about why I want to be here. I love
being at the barn and working with the ponies. I have a ton
of fun. I have to admit being with a little pony that comes
up to your waist is wicked cute! But I am not here only to
have fun. I am here to work. I have a responsibility to train
ponies for children that need a friend, children that want
to have fun and want to love something. I am not denying that
I have the most fun in the world going to the barn with my
best friend and being around adorable ponies, but differently-abled
children want to do that too. I want to be here to help in
some small way so that these special children can enjoy taking
care of their Personal Pony. So they have a chance to answer,
“Yes” to the slogan: "Have you hugged your
Personal Pony today?"
-Kaitlyn Dearth
Haberlin's Hope Farm
Massachusetts
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