Some say that the future is a fiction, and so live for the moment. This is not possible for me to do. There might be dire consequences if I adhere to what some think is a truism. For instance, those in the know are saying that Mt. Spur, an Alaska volcano, could blow any time. This is bad news for this horse owner. But what am I supposed to do, take a wait/see attitude?

The ash will fall and there my ponies will be, inhaling what has come their way. They’ll of course be coughing, and their respiratory systems may be permanently fucked up. So I must plan for the future. I just spoke with Pete, and we decided to put the horses in the trailer during the worst of it. They can’t stay in there long, but in the meantime, we’ll be able to rig something else up, say tarps on the far side of the outside shelter. Two of the mares can go in there. And the other mare – we might put her in the shelter between the two hay stalls.

So the horses will be out of direct ash. The same is true of the goats and chickens who already live in the shelter.

The up side of the volcano going is that I might not have to go to Nome. I actually would like some time off, and so postponing this trip would be fine by me.

All future concerns here. Today I went for a ride on Raudi – we rode our trails. Raudi was energetic and moved out several times. She remained still when, a few hundred yards away, a side wheeler went rolling down the trail. The dogs did not remain still. Ryder took off with Shadow on her heels. There was nothing I could do about this, so I had Raudi race beside her.

The dogs did come back, just as I crested the upper trail. I did not give them treats because I was out, but I did tell them that they were good dogs. And, just as worrisome. There were people using the Jim’s Road Trail. They were heading up as Raudi, Shadow, and Ryder were heading down.

They were just getting out of a car when we happened to be in their vicinity. Shadow wasn’t as interested as Ryder was in checking out their dogs, but she thought, well, this must be fun, after all it involves running, so I am going to ignore Alys and pay attention to Ryder.

I was surprised because I thought Ryder was too old for that kind of thing. She sleeps hard and fast and looks like death warmed over. But out on the trail, she’s a much younger dog.

And so, the trails are being used on Saturday mornings by those who don’t respect them or the other users. My thought is that this is not going to change because the mindset of these people is also the mindset of the local, state, and national governments.

Tomorrow is the future. I am going to spend the day at home, getting ready to go to Nome.

81. 3/23/25: ED Report, What is Humanly Possible?