I rarely answer my phone when I don’t recognize the number, on the assumption that if it is important they will leave a message. Those who know me well also know that I rarely check my voicemail, on the assumption that if it is urgent, someone will text.

This is despite the fact that I’m constantly talking on the phone and would die without my Blackberry. How else would I answer my emails while driving to the vet, Facebook message a client about a horse for sale while watching a student ride it in the ring, or randomly scroll through updated statuses of people I can’t quite place while holding a horse for the farrier?

But for the first few days I was stabled at The Fork CIC*** in North Carolina (April 7-10), I got in the habit really quick of taking a call from an unknown number.

Everyone knows that the countdown to “the big three-day” of your season, whether it be the Morven Park CCI* or the Rolex Kentucky CCI****, normally starts about three to four weeks out. This is the time when you’re inches away from being qualified or you’ve just gotten qualified, and the hope of actually arriving at your destination becomes something you can almost touch.

This time is also when “the unknown” looms especially large and dark on riders’ horizons… the hot nail and abscess, the strained tendon or ligament, the rider getting injured in a fall from a young horse, or just some other random thing.

This “unknown” is the thing that wakes you up in the middle of the night in a sweat or has you icing your horse after a quiet hack “just in case.” But it’s also a part of the thrill and intensity of eventing. At this point in the spring season, I don’t think I’m alone in needing a Xanax at the end of the day to settle down!

In my case, my horse Tate [Manoir de Carneville] literally “kicked off” this chain of night sweats and self-directed “Settle the *#@! down, Sinead!!” chats at The Fork.

This is how it went: I hear my phone ring, look at the number and don’t recognize it… Ignore. That familiar 1 New Voicemail screen pops up… I’ll check it later.

My mom calls. I’ll call her back in a bit—I’m in the middle of something. 2 New Voicemails.

“Bulinggg!!” The 1 New Text icon pops up. Mom says nothing but “Call me.” (Notice I said in the beginning that if it’s really important, someone always texts!)

I was setting up dressage rings for the event with Rebecca Howard, but I figured I’d better call her back.

“Hi,” I say in my kind-of annoyed voice; I was obviously busy, or I would have answered the phone! But I try and hide that, because I know I’m just being a brat to my mother.

“Is Tate OK?” she responds.

Instantly I go quiet. Why would Tate not be OK? He’s up in the temporary stabling, and my groom Megan Kepferle is out flagging cross-country jumps, so he should just be hanging out in his stall. And then I remember the other call from an unknown number.

I literally feel panic rising up in my stomach as the blood drains out my face. I answer panicked and confused: “Tate? Yes… I think? Why… What happened?”

She stutters for a second. “Alicia tried to call you. He’s kicked down all the boards in the stall. She said there are splinters and broken boards everywhere…”

I hang up and run.

When I got Tate in England in 2007, I’d just brought him to William Fox-Pitt’s yard, and he was in isolation (three stalls on the backside of the property) for a few days before he was allowed on the main yard. One night one of the horses in iso got loose and was taunting Tate in his box. When I went down to feed him at 7 a.m., all I saw was blood and a hole in the metal door. He’d severed his hind extensor tendon.

I thought he’d be lucky to walk again. He made an unbelievable recovery, competing in his first competition nearly five months later.

But ever since, when Tate gets upset, he get really sensitive with his left hind and kicks out frantically. This is the picture running through my head as I bolt to my truck, leaving strewn As and Cs behind in the half-assembled dressage arena.

I get up to the stall, thanking God that I had at least galloped Tate in the morning so he was wearing four standing bandages. He looks at me, standing perfectly still, as I’m just waiting to see the blood. I see broken boards and a few splinters in the stall, but nothing red yet.

Then I see it—a slice about a centimeter deep into the cap of his right hock. There is no blood. I’m trying to remember what “important” thing is under the cap of the hock. Is there a tendon? Is no blood good? Could no blood be really bad? There’s no way to stitch this… I call Rebecca.

Two minutes later she’s at the stabling, and she doesn’t have to say anything—she knows exactly what I’m feeling. She looks at the cut and then turns and looks at me and says, “Well I think this is why they made caps to the hocks! I think it’s fine. Did you trot him up?”

I breath and say yes, he’s sound, and I just wasn’t sure. And then I begin apologizing, as I see she actually drove up with the flatbed truck that had the the dressage ring in it!

“I’m sorry! I didn’t think it was a big deal, but then I wasn’t sure…” I blather.

She just smiles and says, “It’s always a big deal if it’s Tate,” knowing that if it was one of her top horses she would have reacted the same way: slightly crazy. 🙂

I’m happy to say Princess Tate is just fine, and I’m not sure what set him off. Megan quickly came up from setting flags on the cross-country to hand graze for a million hours until Tater wanted to return to his newly built stall (12 replaced boards), which we fitted with kick pads borrowed from the O’Connors and The Fork. He also got all-he-could-eat steamed hay and hourly hand walks from then on! We carried on to finish fourth in the CIC*** that weekend.

Tate is now in fine form and ready to head to Kentucky in six days. I’m still on edge about that damn “unknown,” but as of today, the sight, taste and smell of Rolex is on the horizon, and I look forward to the feel of the Kentucky Bluegrass!

Read Sinead’s previous posts or visit her website, Sinead Halpin Eventing.