An electrician who had never ridden and was allergic to horses had six months of riding lessons in secret in order to surprise his girlfriend with a horseback proposal. Ryan Schubert had to run into the house and jump into the shower after lessons – and drive to his aunt’s house to get his jodhpurs washed – so Georgina D’Onofrio did not realize he had been riding, at Rockstar Equitation Centre, Cannock. When he felt ready to pop the question, he told Georgina on a Friday night that he was taking her out for all “all you can eat” meal in Wrexham.
“After about an hour’s drive, he said ‘I think we must be lost’,” Georgina said. “I got a bit worried and looked at the sat nav, to see we were going in the opposite direction. After three or four hours’ drive, we ended up on a beach.” The pair stayed in a chalet that night, then on a Saturday morning, Ryan surprised his girlfriend by producing not only her riding clothes – which he had sneaked out of the laundry basket – but his own. “He told me he’d been learning in secret and that we were going to ride with the Cumbria Heavy Horses on the beach; I was laughing and crying at the same time,” Georgina said.
“Part of me was excited, but part was thinking ‘How have you got away with that for six months!’” Georgina said she had always ridden, but that she lost her 30-year-old horse at about the same time she gave birth to her daughter Erin, who had a cleft palate, and that her mother had also had a heart attack at about the same time. As a result of all these issues, Georgina lost her confidence. She owned one horse who had to be sold as things “didn’t work out”, and although she had since bought another, she was very nervous about riding. “Ryan had done all that as he wanted me to get my confidence back,” she said.
“Then these massive 18hh horses turned up and I was terrified!” In rain and strong winds, the pair rode along the beach with escorts, who were in on the surprise. “Ryan jumped off, went down on one knee and asked; ‘Will you marry me?’ Georgina said. “Everyone was saying ‘What’s your answer?’ but I was saying ‘What?’ because it was so windy, I couldn’t hear him – then I realized, and I said yes. I still can’t believe it, it’s like something out of a film,” Georgina said. “For someone who’s ridden her whole life, and then been through that trauma, this got me riding again. He’s given me my wings back.”
