Spooked

Danae was excited when she returned home from an afternoon of horseback riding. "That was so much fun!" she told her family. "We went on a trail ride through the woods. My horse was spooked once, but I didn't fall off!"

"Spooked?" asked Danae's little brother. "Did you see a ghost?"

Danae laughed. "No, David," she said. "It's just that when horses see something they don't expect--like a piece of paper blowing in the wind--they might all of a sudden jump sideways or try to run away. We call that being spooked. If you're not a good rider, you might fall off when the horse does that."

"Horses are so big!" said David. "Why would papers scare them?"

Danae shrugged. "I don't know. They just do," she said. "But if the horse knows you and trusts you, he usually calms down and you can get him to go places he'd be scared to go otherwise."

"Sounds like you've learned a lot about horses and how to ride them," said Dad. "Your description of how a horse responds when he trusts his rider is a g