Claire The Mule Is Truly Magical

Yesterday, I snapped that shot of the two mules, Claire and Honey, out by the front of the driveway. It kind of looked like they were standing guard, shoulder to shoulder with Claire carrying the US flag on her right shoulder. I always like a patriotic image. And Claire is a patriot.

I never would have written anything worthwhile had I not met Claire the Mule during those early morning rounds when I first arrived in Berthoud.

Claire always was waiting for me at her fence line at her then family’s property. While I did most of the talking (go figure) during those meet ups, Claire’s ears would rapidly shift in semaphore mode above her head and her lips would move like she was forming words, and I understood everything she shared. If you’ve watched some of Claire’s videos, you’ll see her lips moving. It took a while for me to realize that no one else could hear her voice.

I would tell her stories about my life, and she would listen patiently. It was better than therapy.

While Claire had suffered the mountain related hardships that are mentioned in the book, including having the tip of her right ear curled from freezing, at the time we met, she was living with a wonderful family – Mike, Amy, Delaney and Charles F – who had adopted her from a sibling who had adopted her from her past life and later had to move from the area.

This young family was very busy with work and school and extra curriculars, like any proper family should be. Absolutely lovely family. But I could sense that Claire felt a little lonely. But more than that, I was lonely too.

Freeing Claire from being trapped in the wire fence is a true story.

I was still adjusting to life on Mars.

I had a lot of property (compared to NY) that I was willing to share with Claire. And I was always around and willing to be distracted with regular interactions throughout the day, so, at the prompting of another local friend named Pam, I asked the F’s if I could adopt her.

They generously said yes. Love that family like they are my own. They ultimately moved to their ten acres of promise land in Missouri, but we still stay in touch. Claire remains as much a part of their family as she is apart of ours. Indeed, Claire has become part of every reader’s family. She is that kind of creature.

Now a little back story. I named the Mrs. Reynolds from TWA after a sweet older Irish woman who lived up the block from me in Riverdale, on Liebig (Big Lie) Avenue just off Mosholu. Mrs. R had a wonderful brogue and had become friends with Spaghetti’s wife, Posey. Mrs. R was always so nice to the McCaffrey urchins. So, I put her in the book.

One of Mrs. Reynolds’ grown sons, Mike, worked with my dad in the Insurance field. He was a nice man, too.

Anyway, Claire came to live at what became Casa Claire and the rest is history.

Once Claire was around 24/7, I knew she was still lonely by the way she stared off at the other horses on the neighboring property, so we rescued Mr. Rogers from a slaughter auction.

The two were inseparable and MR was the sweetest creature I have ever encountered.

For a year I’ve never felt such happiness from other creatures.

It triggered a desire in me to share their story somehow.

Oh, and I do suffer from living on NY time. I was always an early riser back in NY. Don’t sleep more than 6 hours. So, my usual 4ish wake up time became 2ish when I got to NoCo. I was spending each day from 2 am to whatever time the East Coast (and my legal life) came on line, twiddling my thumbs. I couldn’t be making noise around the house because Lisa was working and still needed her sleep. I would go out and feed Claire and MR just to check on them in the still frightening NoCo night. They were fine, but seeing them always made me feel better.

One morning I came back in from feeding the mules and decided to write down my stories. Of course you write what you know so I did.

If you go back a few weeks in my blogs, you’ll see a photo that is otherwise not discussed but suggests some things. So pay attention. Even better yet, go back to the first blog in January 2021, and bring yourself up to speed, you’ll see how most of that past life bled over into my writing.

And the magical, mystical and extraterrestrial stuff? Well now, that would be telling.

Now I didn’t plot anything, I just wrote. I don’t actually remember the details of writing, or, as I sit here now, even the details of what I have written.

The story just flowed. Claire had triggered and reawakened my creativity.

For the record, I never change the story once it is written.

At the time I wrote TWA, I didn’t think the world would ever see it, so I wrote whatever I wanted. I tossed every rule of writing in the trash, and most grammar and punctuation rules as well. Even some of the spelling rules went right out the window. I’m more naturally an oral traditionalist.

Since I didn’t believe any human would ever see my writing, I used to share the latest updates with Claire each day. Her ears twitched and her lips moved like there was electricity flowing through them. MR would stand back and wait for Claire to translate it for him. Claire made a few suggestions along the way. She wanted to make sure I did right by the non-human creatures in the story. And the telepathy thing. I took all of her notes.

I included all of my friends. I wanted them to be part of the party.

Of course, Lisa also read what I wrote as I wrote it. I wanted Lisa to know that I was working on something in case she came across it in a drawer sometime in the future. All she ever said was “that’s good.” High praise that keeps me from getting above myself. Lisa has been my rock. That’s all I needed.

Twelve weeks from the typing that first sentence, working two hours each morning, I wrapped The Wise Ass.

It sat in a drawer for a while. The entire fall of 2019. Then a writer friend from NJ, who was temporarily living in NoCo, named Ricky Ginsburg (his latest novel, K47, is awesome), suggested I submit it to Black Rose Writing. So I did, and then forgot about it.

In early March 2020, I received an email that literally changed my life. BRW wanted to publish TWA.

On February 18th, 2021, I got to show Claire the book with her face on its cover and her story on its pages.

Since then, Claire gave me more stories to tell. They became The Claire Saga.

This morning, when I went to check on Amazon, I found all five books with Claire’s lovely face gracing the cover, sitting together in one of Amazon’s Top 100 Best Sellers lists:

So, don’t ever try to convince this Mick that there is no magic in this world (or out of it for that matter).

Well, now I must reenter my reality.

Thursdays are for wrapping the dreamers’ work week.

So, for those of you fine, five readers where the dreamer foo shits, have that last cuppa and wrap your work week.

Friday is best spent planning the weekend.

Now I’ve got some kitties to to cuddle and rounds to make – Claire made me promise to continue my rounds to her non-human friends, even after she came to live at Casa Claire. It’s always been a pleasure.

So, let us all get to it.

And, whatever we may have before us, let us make today a great one.