Can You Believe It.....on the Arabian Horse Farm....Bigtime!

Sometimes I just don't know what to expect out of life. By the time I think I have things figured out something new comes along and knocks me for a loop. Today has been one of those days.

It started last night when I got a call from a friend. Lindsay had told me she'd called earlier in the day when I was still working horses. I'd forgotten about that call until the friend called again.

I expected my friend to be calling about Daffodil business or maybe something about the rescue stuff being organized for our county. Instead she began telling me about a woman she'd met through those efforts that was trying to locate flood victims from those floods of last month.

The woman had contacted county officials and wasn't getting any help finding horse owners who had flood damage on their property. She had grant funds for flood victims and needed to get them disbursed or return them.

My friend remembered reading Farm Flooding at Rising Rainbow Arabians and seeing those pictures on my blog. She thought I might fit the criteria and qualify for help with the amount of flooding we had experienced and Dave losing his job. The friend was calling me to verify and put me in touch with this woman.

I have to say off the top of my head I figured our flooding sure didn't amount to what others had gone through. Even though the flooding here had reached the scope of our hundred year flood table, I thought we'd fared pretty well. We only had barn aisleways under water and about 9 wet stalls. We hadn't lost any feed although we lost use of our fields for a few weeks. I told my friend all of that and she still seemed to think we fit the criteria. It had something to do with silt damage and boy we did have silt. That stuff was everywhere about an inch thick in my turnaround not to mention that in my fields.

I took down the name of the woman and the partial name I was given of the organization she represents. I was supposed to email my friend a couple paragraphs or so telling what had happened here and include the pictures. I planned on doing that today after I got my work done with the horses.

Then today after dropping off my first load of horses and loading up the second, I went into the house to use the rest room before I headed back to Richard's. I checked the messages on my answering machine while I grabbed a bun and slapped a piece of meat and cheese on the thing so I could head back to Richard's as quickly as possible and still get a bite to eat.

The third and final message on my machine was from this woman,
Wilma Thornstead from the organization known as Ripley's. Ripley's what I didn't catch from my friend and the woman only said Ripley's. She left me her home number and a cell number and asked me to call her back asap.

I waited until I pulled into Richard's to make the call since I don't have a hands free device for my cell phone (they make me crazy). I figured I could unload the first horse and talk at the same time.

Imagine my surprise to hear this woman telling me my farm qualified for pasture relief from the extent of our flooding. Her organization was going to supply us with a month's worth of hay for my horses. I asked if we needed to fill out paperwork or provide pictures and other documentation only to be told it was already authorized. It was a done deal she just needed to pay for the hay and set up delivery.

To be honest, I was in shock. Things like this just don't happen to me. But hear I was talking to a woman asking me if I had storage for 8.5 tons of hay and if orchard grass was all right. Well, I do have that kind of storage and orchard grass is great but who gets that kind of help out of nowhere?

I heard Wilma say again she needed to pay for the hay. Then she'd call us back to make arrangements for the delivery. But to be honest, I still didn't believe it. I gave her both my cell number and Dave's telling her he would probably be the person home to "accept" a delivery since I'd be gone working horses whenever this was all worked out. I nearly forgot to say "thank you!" I was still so stunned.

I swear it wasn't fifteen minutes later when Wilma called me back happy to tell me the hay was paid. Then she said she was sorry they couldn't do more. (In my head I'm thinking MORE, what the heck, lady do you know how much this means!! but the words didn't come out!)

Wilma also said we needed to call the feed company to set up a time for delivery. She'd tried to call Dave but hadn't reached him so she'd left a message with the phone numbers. OK, by now it's beginning to sink in, I'm getting free hay for a month within the next few days and I darn well better get my hay loft cleaned out so there's somewhere to put it. Still to be honest, I was in shock! I didn't know what to say and a mere "thank you" just didn't seem like enough. I did however manage to get the words out but they just seemed hollow next to the gift I was just given.



I tried to call Dave but didn't reach him either. However, shortly after he called me to say he'd received Wilma's call and the hay was on its way. But Dave was really confused, all he knew was he got a call from an unknown woman telling him to make arrangements for a hay delivery. He had no idea why we were getting hay or who this woman was, let alone that it was "pasture relief."

The first phone call I made to Wilma was at about 1 pm and now it was only 1:30. Dave had called the number for delivery and the hay was coming NOW, not in a day or two or next Monday, it was on its way. Dave heard they had only been waiting on an address to deliver.

Dave had barely arrived home from a dentist's appointment. Now he found himself franticly rushing to get the loft cleared out. He felt as off balance by this whole thing as I did. In my mind I'm thinking, "If this is a dream, don't anyone pinch me. I want to relish it for a while."

The next time I talked to Dave it was a little after 3 pm. I was on my way home with my second load of horses worked. The hay had not arrived yet. I figured they must have had to load it first and the truck would probably arrive sometime after I did.

Well, that was wrong........This truckload of hay arrived maybe a minute ahead of me. As I rounded the corner to my street I saw the rig pulling into my driveway. It was REAL! This beautiful load of orchard grass hay was going into MY farm!!

By 4:30 all 8.5 tons were snug in my loft. The delivery truck and trailer were gone. Both Dave and I were sitting in our living room stunned! We are still stunned. To show you how stunned Dave is, about an 10 pm he says to me, I guess this means I don't have to go get hay on Sunday. Yupe, those brain cells are too stunned to work! I wonder how long that will last? LOL

These people from an organization I don't even know the whole name of gave us a month's worth of hay for my entire herd of 28 horses because of the silt damage to my pastures. Can you even imagine?? Like I said before, if this is a dream, don't anybody pinch me. I'd really like to relish this for a while. Talk about taking a load of stress off.......

I'm going to have to find out the full name of this organization so I can properly thank them. And, of course, I need to say a big thanks to my friend. I'm pretty sure even she will be surprised at the extent of this help. She'd said something like maybe $500 worth of hay......... this was a whole lot more money than that. I really am speechless........and grateful. It couldn't have come at a better time. Good things do happen sometimes. Can you believe that?

Note: These pictures are a couple of the pictures I intended to send my friend to show our flooding.



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