Amish in Ojai

On the way back from the beach the other day, we drove the back way, thru Ojai, and right before Ojai is a little town called Oakview. In the little town is a dude named John Morgan who for the last 26 years has fixed horse carriages. He's the closest to Amish I can get in Los Angeles. Since Maggie's borrowed horse cart has a broken shaft, we had to get new shafts, the poles that stick out front, and they're 12 feet long and carved the way an Amish guy would carve, I guess. So I walked into this massive carriage house, like a carvern of carriages, all beautiful and all jammed happily in like if you asked Santa for a carriage for Christmas, and then you could shrink down into his pack and be surrounded by all the carriages he was delivering, you'd be coated in carriages. So I was. And I got to meet John Morgan, who is a 74 year old carriage maker, and I guess his son or grandson, who was probably my age, and they helped me get the pieces I needed to make our cart work for Maggie. The greatest part was, they were so NICE. They walked slowly, they let the kids climb into the carriages. They explained how to attach my shaft pieces to my cart at home so I'd do it right. They did everything happily, and peacefully. I figured out why everything was so happy there. There is nobody there. There is no depressingly long line like at Lowe's when you need to find a part for something. There is no air of defeat, like at an auto parts store, where everyone has a ring through their nose. Because there are no customers. Because there are cars. Because who the hell buys carriage parts when the country is on its knees economically, and everyone just wants their car to run so they can keep going to their shreds of jobs. There are cars. Nobody relies on carriages. So John Morgan can work his particular magic for Disneyland, and make parts for carriages where people use carriages in their businesses, and for hobbies. But I liked that there's something in the world I like more than anything - going slowly in a fast world. Looking around while your horse clip clops around slower than you actually walk. I like that there is a guy near Ojai who sits amongst all these carriages and sells obsolete items, in this relaxed and wonderful way. His whole lofty warehouse seemed filled with sighs, and hope.