All dispatches have beginnings, middles, and ends. Sometimes the chronology varies. I am going to start this one at the day’s end. Pete and I got out on the horses tonight, at 9:00 p.m. There was still time to get in a ride in on what we call “our” trails. Everyone calls our trails our trails. If, say, they belonged to us by virtue of our spending more time on them than anyone else, well then, they’d be our trails.

I’m talking about a three mile loop. It’s been too wet to head down to the Moose Meadows, although they go there. The best time to ride down there is of course in the winter when the route is what I call the White Highway.

Tonight, we were out riding, and I got to thinking that what brings me the most joy are two things. One, of course, is being with and riding the horses. And the other is writing. I am doing little of one and none of the other. And every day, I get to handle the books of successful writers.

But yeah, I got to thinking, I would like to work on the book project just three days a week. Pete says this is coming, that we might in time be able to do this. I need an assistant operations manager and for us to have an Executive Director. This is not beyond the realm of possibility.

Tonight, as I rode, this was the first time that this seemed like a reality.

It has been a very up and down journey, with the ups and downs reaching mind boggling extremes. Now, our volunteer coordinator has quit and taken a job with GCI – he explained to me what he’d be doing, but I did not understand what he was talking about. It did sound to me that whatever he will be doing, that he’ll be in the thick of it.

I do wonder how someone could jump ship like this, without looking back, going from working for two nonprofits in which the focus is on social betterment, to a for profit in which corporate interests are the driving force.

It may be as I suspected, that this individual’s primary goal in life is to put what he knows about computers to use in the corporate sector. I wonder if he will ever look back and wonder if he made a mistake. Or ever look back and wonder if something, deep down in his soul, is now lacking.

I didn’t think about all this until just now.

I will tell him to look me up in ten years and we’ll then talk about his past year, for he did work for a year for us.

All I can say tonight is – wow.

Next: 195. 7/19/26: Lessons Learned