Letter To: Councilmember District 3 Bob Blumenfield, 200 N Spring St. Los Angeles, CA 90012
“I was born in Encino. I grew up in Woodland Hills. I have watched as the big ugly apartments have taken over the San Fernando Valley. I find it so refreshing to hear “large scale apartments should not be wedged in-between single-family homes by right.”
I have a campaign that focuses on this. I have enclosed a copy. I hope you will support my fight. These big ugly apartments use too much energy and create too much traffic.
We need to support the people living here now. More libraries, more high schools, more DMVs. More social services.
I also am sharing my book “To Ride a Painted Pony Wild.” I share my youth riding the hills of Woodland Hills. I shared a story about when Canoga Ave. was a two-lane street. Near Ventura Blvd was a stable which housed a lovely red barn, whereas young girls marveled at the horse tack and leather saddles going back generations. Even Horse Buggy Parts and all the tools to care for horses.
I drove down Canoga Ave the other day. It was a shock to me to see all the apartments going up. Right next to the freeway. All the eucalyptus and pepper trees cut down. Do you remember when it was a lazy two-lane highway?”
The 1970s, The San Fernando Valley and The Santa Monica Mountains
Horses and their girls….
During a tumultuous era marked by global unrest and climate change, I recall a hopeful time shaped by nature, integrity, and innocence. Elton John’s music and Bernie Taupin’s lyrics amplified these experiences. My autobiographical novella, set in the San Fernando Valley and nearby California counties, follows three years of friendship and horseback riding through the Santa Monica Mountains. The story offers a journey into the female psyche and evokes memories of an untamed Valley, with “Madman Across the Water” and “Don’t Shoot Me I’m Only the Piano Player” providing the soundtrack as my friends and I sang Bernie Taupin’s lyrics during our rides.
Excerpt from beginning of Chapter Three.
3. HEADLESS HORSEMAN ROAD
A song we were singing ~ All the Nasties – By Elton John, Lyrics by Bernie Taupin
Canoga Avenue from Mulholland to Oxnard was overwhelmingly wild in the 1970s. It was only a two-lane avenue lined with some residential homes, farms, and empty fields. The enormous eucalyptus trees monstered along Canoga Avenue exalting the heart of Woodland Hills. We chased wild rabbits bareback where the city of Warner Center now suffocates the land.
Stealing pumpkins late at night from the many pumpkin patches was a scary treat for us kids around autumn. Now Kaiser Permanente stands tall over ghostly pumpkins which linger there only in my mind.
Ruff and I rode our horses after school which did not give us much time. We had to make it back home around dusk. This gave us a couple of hours to ride. We had it in our minds to visit down an old dirt road up near Canoga Ave., moving south towards Mulholland. We noticed this dirt road a few times on our rides up to Mulholland where it seemed endless trails awaited us, but now was not the time.
The dirt road branched off to the east and seemed a long one. The everyday valley trees mixed and mingled along the road with large rough trunks and heavy-handed branches. A small forest. We got off our horses to look around.
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