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04-28-21: This was probably the last straw.

It has been a long time coming, as these things tend to be for me. Its a terribly long story, but I this is the brief.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m quick to cut things off lots of times, but when I put my attention toward a client and commit, all too often, I bring it to the bitter end. This is a place I have invested so much into.

This barn is a place I have thought about quitting every time I drive down the driveway since I started all the way back in around 2012. It’s always something different, but its always something. It is always a hard grind. Its also over an hour away, which ads insult to injury when things aren’t so wondrous.

Frankly, I never wanted to start this account in the first place as I had been repeatedly warned that this is a tough place to get paid. Even today I run into farriers that say they have worked there and never got paid. I can’t tell you how many times I have shown up to find they have no shavings or food or whatever because they haven’t paid the bills. We have had a few problems and one really close call a winter or so ago, but I’m really proud that I have been able to keep things going there.

Today, I had a long list of horses to shoe and I worked my heart out to get some of the troublesome ones done before the barn manager left. I succeeded.

After a while of working away by myself on the farm (because they recently lost most of their staff), I couldn’t take it any longer and ran out for lunch. This is something I almost never do, but I needed a break and I was starting to feel the effects of hunger.

Anyway, when I got back to the barn, the fucking dogs were out.

This a real problem; an ongoing problem. I don’t normally care one way or the other about dogs around, but this is an entirely different annoying and sketchy situation.

I would go on, but the point here is really supposed to just be that I have a really big decision to make that I may have really already made.

Maybe sleeping on it will help. One thing for sure is that rash decisions are never good – though its a little hard to call something I have stewed over for near a decade rash.

The reality is that this could very well be the change I need to greatly increase my effectiveness in getting some of my more interesting projects going here.

We shall see.