Fire Update

As quickly as it came through, the fire is now done. The sky is once again blue, albeit hazy from leftover smokiness. The only good by-product of a fire is having the most spectacular sunsets--the colors are breath-taking. (Pictures coming soon.)

We evacuated our horses last Tuesday to a local barn, and then brought them home again on Thursday evening. I thought it would be a huge ordeal and our horses would have a hard time with the uproar of fast moves and crazy living arrangements, but I am happy to report that everyone just rolled with the punches. By Saturday it was just as if we had never left. My biggest surprise was that I felt the same way.

The past year has been hard for me, being the control freak that I am. We had a devastating fire at our then-current barn last October. It was a huge fire with no warning, and I, my daughter E and my client Lori, were literally the last ones up the canyon road to the barn. The county Fire team closed the road (the only way into or out of the canyon) as soon as we went through. There were just a dozen or so people at the facility, and because the fire was moving at an incredible speed, we had no time at all to evacuate any horses. So we all ran around the barn, gathering all the horses each of us could hold. (Have you ever tried walking six large dogs at the same time? Multiply that by 1,000+ pounds per panicky horse.) We hustled them to the most fireproof place on the property (an open courtyard with cement/sand footing), and stood there holding them while the fire literally blasted and burned across the treetops above us. Embers flew everywhere, starting little fires all around us, and burning us and the horses. That was the longest thirty minutes of my life. When it was finally past us, we spent the rest of the day re-settling the horses and putting out hundreds of hot spots. We lost our hay storage building, and the barn workers who lived on the property lost their trailer homes, but no horses or people were injured. (Other barns in our canyon were not so lucky.)

The aftermath was difficult, as we weren't able to work our horses for more than two months after the fire. Horses are extremely sensitive to air quality, and smoke damage can quickly lead to pneumonia. So the resident wisdom is to take six to eight weeks off (or more) and then slowly work back to your normal routine. It was hard to endure the forced inactivity, but it paid off--none of the horses in our care had any long-lasting effects. But it felt like it took FOREVER.

After that experience, we have lived in "hyper-fire" mode, and keep an eye on the temperature and humidity readings like weather Nazis. Hence my feelings of near-panic about this latest fire danger--not the actual fire itself, but the after-effects. And because we had a plan in mind and were able to be so pro-active at the very beginning of this latest incident, we all came through it with flying colors. What a huge relief. Not just because of the safety of everyone involved (which is definitely a huge factor), but also because we can go right back to our normal routine. And in record time.

In the words of Bruce Willis at the end of "Die Hard": Yippee Ki Yay Motherfucker. Great ending to a less-than-perfect situation.

Fire Fire Everywhere

Well boys and girls, it's fire season once again. And it's at our barn. I took the photo you see above yesterday afternoon at our facility. The fire was at the back of the property across the street, with the blasting wind driving the fire straight at us. There was a mad scramble to get horses and possessions moved. Fortunately, we got our horses out in good time--they're safely ensconced in a nearby smoke-free barn. My daughter E helped coordinate our horses (as well as many others) at the evacuation site while I and a number of other boarders worked on moving more horses and gear at our barn. The giant water-dropping helicopters were dashing back and forth from the orchard reservoir (about a half-mile away from us) to the fire line, just skimming the treetops above us, deafening everyone in the process and scaring all the remaining horses. It was like a Keystone Kopps film, only not in a funny way.

This morning, our facility is out of immediate danger, but the fire is still raging out of control to the west of us, heading towards more homes, barns, and populated areas, making its way to the ocean--the only true firebreak. We're still helping to coordinate the horse evacuations (I am a telephoning fool this morning), so even if structures burn, the people and animals will be safe.

Send us some kind thoughts and if you have any influence over the weather (my mom is a champion cloud chaser), please move the high pressure system out of our area--we're expecting more extremely hot and dry days this week, the classic Red Flag Warning stuff that puts everyone in southern California on high alert.

Stay tuned for more updates from Fire Central.

Goals and Passions or What Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?

I've spent a fair portion of my life flitting from pillar to post, not really knowing what to do with my energy and ambition. I went to work every day and got a paycheck, and dabbled in a few things here and there. I was always involved with horses, and rode and trained and taught lessons off and on for most of my life. Once my daughter E came along, I shifted my focus into raising her, as her dad left the scene before she was a year old. (My decision, not his.) My only brother died in 1986 at age 27, but we've kept in contact with his wife and daughter since his death. They moved to Idaho and bought property, and raise horses. We went to visit them the first time when E was 6 or 7, and so to prepare her to spend time with their horses, I got her started in horseback riding lessons. That was it--she was hooked. She's been riding ever since, and we got her first horse (The Little Brown Pony) when she was 10.

We love to watch all the medical shows, and blood and guts and the coroner's office are all fascinating viewing as far as we're concerned. E's love of the medical field, combined with her love of horses (and all animals) naturally lead her to be interested in veterinary medicine. In fact my brother's daughter is a practicing veterinarian in Washington state, so E could have had a good "in" in the field. But over the course of time, she has become much more focused on her riding. We bought her first real show horse three years ago, and even though he's got his issues and is not the horse of her dreams, he took her to the next level of riding, and she found out that the thrill and excitement of jumping big takes her to a place she's never experienced before. She absolutely loves it, and throws her entire being into all aspects of improving her skills.

We go to the barn every day to work our horses as well as the horses in training with us. I do most of the planning, teaching, and oversight and E is the rider. We discuss (ad nauseum) all aspects of our practice, and how we feel we're doing, and what plans we want to make for her riding, our clients, and our business overall. Being a somewhat pessimistic person by nature, I have learned from my daughter that I really need to just lighten up. My first response to many things is "no--not possible". She is just the opposite, and her response is "why not try it?". E has the lofty goal of someday (soon) riding on the US Olympic Equestrian team. When I first heard that I thought she was overreaching and would fail and be disappointed. But she was persistent, and then I wondered why I was so restrictive in my thinking. SOMEONE rides on the Olympic team--why not her? It's a hard road and will take a lot of time and effort, but she's not afraid of hard work and neither am I. The hardest part will be finding the right horse--that takes a lot of money. You either have to have it yourself, or have a client with money who wants a horse shown. Again, E has plans for that. She is writing a letter asking people and businesses to sponsor her. The worst they can do is say no, and if they say yes, she'll be that much closer to her goal.

E walked early (at 9 months) but started talking very late (almost 18 months). However, once the talking started, it has not EVER stopped (i.e. if she's awake, the mouth is moving), and the joke for a long time was that she was doing the color commentary of her life as she went. She talks even when no one is around. The main advantage in this for me is that if I just shut up, I hear absolutely everything that is going on in her life. She talks about everything, and one of her favorite subjects is how she feels sorry for her friends that don't have any kind of passion for something, anything, in their lives. This is another of the many reasons I love having kids, especially girls, spend their time at the barn. Whatever work you put into it, you get back in self-esteem. It also puts a major dent in the time spent in front of the TV, the refrigerator, and the computer. The best part for the girls is that their self-esteem is based on the satisfaction that comes from their own hard work, and not from whether some boy likes them or if they're in the popular group at school. I love my kid, but she definitely marches to her own drummer (middle school was not too pleasant for her), so the horses have given her a poise and self-confidence that she would have been hard-pressed to find elsewhere. This has helped E in every aspect of her life, and has given her a terrific ability to see what she wants to do and make plans on how to get there.

We've got our work cut out for us, but E is not afraid of a fast horse or a big fence, so now we just need to get the rest of the support system in place for her to reach her goals. She really wants to make a name for herself, and I know she will. Keep your eyes peeled--hopefully you'll be seeing that "knockout" kid from California in the Olympic news in the not-too-distant future.

Just Call Me Elvis Cuz I'm All Shook Up

In light of recent events, especially the death of our beloved pony, I feel like I'm on the Viper super-roller-coaster at Six Flags Magic Mountain. There's no question that this will take a lot of time to heal, but I am sick of feeling like I have no control over anything, and I'm also tired of being depressed every minute. So I am hereby making a pledge to be nauseatingly Pollyanna-like, even if for a few minutes.

Point One: There are fires raging out of control here in Southern California, and we moved our horse business just in the nick of time. Where we are now is nicer and smoke free. Where we were is now less than a mile from the front line of the fire's northwest edge. I can't tell you how happy I am about that.

Point Two: No one at my day job got a raise this month, which is usually when we do this sort of thing every year. However, we still all have jobs that pay well, and no one got laid off. That's a big deal right now when many firms in the CPA world are laying off 20% to 30% of their staff.

Point Three: When paying my bill this month, I found that I have over 3,000 rollover minutes on my cell phone plan. Wow! I can now bore everyone I know with endless trivia talk to anyone I like for as long as I want. That was a cool find.

Point Four: It is now the beginning of a three-day-weekend. Yay! Sleep late, spend time at the barn, work horses, and veg on the couch afterwards. I am looking forward to that.

I think that's as much as I can do right now. I hope you and yours have a safe and fun holiday weekend. Got any fun plans?