Whitley County author Diana du Pont’s new book, Fur Mama, chronicles her odyssey after adopting an ex-racehorse & a shelter dog, and trading a successful career in the California art museum business for life on a Midwest farm.
With great passion and insight, du Pont’s moving memoir explores what she describes as “the social phenomenon of embracing and humanizing pets, and the benefits we discover when we do.”
Here WBOI's Julia Meek and Diana discuss the “incredible journey” itself and her transformation into a devoted animal parent for a whole new kind of “family.”
Event Information: Upcoming Author's Book Signings
Barnes & Noble, Glenbrook Square
Tuesday, April 14
Noon to 3:00pm
Barnes & Noble, Orchard Crossing
Saturday, May 9
(Time tba)
Find more information and and how to order Fur Mama: at the author's website.
This is a transcript of our conversation:
Julia Meek: Diana du Pont, welcome.
Diana du Pont: Oh, thank you so much. Julia, it's a pleasure to be here with you.
Julia Meek: Now, your new book describes the odyssey that you have been on for the last three decades, and your passion for and following your Fur Mama nature.
So very, very briefly. Diana, what did revive your girlhood passion for the equestrian life?
Diana du Pont: Oh, my goodness, I moved to the central coast of California, to a town that supported living with horses. They would be in people's backyards. I would drive by.
Julia Meek: So, having it always being one of your favorite things, it hooked you. It really caught you. Oh, that is awesome.
Now, okay, you mention it being a cure for your workaholism, [chuckles] but it seems your passion for your animal family is obsession itself, in a good way.
When did you know you were hooked again on horses, it was a girlhood passion of yours, and that you just couldn't live without them anymore?
Diana du Pont: I-- [chuckles] it was so funny, because I moved there, to Santa Barbara, and I just within one year, I kept thinking, oh, I should postpone this.
Uh-uh. No, went for it. Got a horse. [laughs] And my husband was a big part of it, because I kept thinking, I had to concentrate on my new job. [both laugh]
And he said, oh, no, they're all around. They're easy to have here. They're easy, you can have them. They're in your backyard. And that's what happened.
Julia Meek: May I ask, was he a horse person as well?
Diana du Pont: He is not a rider, but he rode as a child, and so he had a sympathy for it, and he had a sympathy for the outdoors and being with animals. So, it was a perfect match.
Julia Meek: And certainly understood your own.
Diana du Pont: Oh yeah, totally supports.
Julia Meek: That's wonderful. So off-track thoroughbred and later, a rescue black lab that you couldn't live without, where has this taken you, this odyssey, this declaration of animal love?
Diana du Pont: Well, what's amazing is I had never thought of myself as maternal. You know, I was marinated in the cries of environmentalism and zero population growth, [Julia laughs] as well as the battle cries of feminism.
And it was career, career, career. And if you're going to get married, you know, marry late, and if you're going to have children, adopt them. And so, I just kept pushing for that.
And I come to this town, and I see that everybody's happily coexisting with their animals. And I start this journey with these animals, and at first, you're caring for them, and soon you know that something's missing, and you keep pursuing their nurturing.
And as I nurtured them, I discovered that I wanted to nurture more, and I really discovered another kind of motherhood.
That's where my odyssey took me, and that is after having been raised with a mother who just said, “All I have is kids, kids, kids.”
She was troubled, she was an alcoholic, and I just followed her addiction, but I did the socially acceptable kind, which is work. [laughs]
Julia Meek: Well, you do mention you're a Type A drive. Was it equally ruling your life as the art curator, author, path you had been on (very successful) when you were struck by the animal love bug?
Diana du Pont: You have that phase. But what's interesting is that this horse and this dog taught me to slow down.
Because you can't have the nurturing relationship with and take in a very fractious and sensitive horse unless you slow down.
It's danger. It's a recipe for danger if you don't slow down.
Julia Meek: Did you realize that when you jumped into it, or was that...?
Diana du Pont: No, it's it evolved, it evolved. and I had some real wrong turns, I mean, some kind of deathly wrong turns, and I got out of them by the skin of my teeth.
But then I realized, you know, patience is a virtue, and that's one of the things that they taught me.
Julia Meek: They taught you. And honestly, Diana, what has your passion, then as now, done for you that even a really pretty satisfying career path like you had could not.
Diana du Pont: Well, what I found out, Julia, is that when I was working it was one project after another, one achievement, one triumph.
And you [laughs] at a certain point, you realize that this is kind of a narcissistic approach to living. [Julia chuckles] It's like, because I was working with art, which has its own mission, you're on a mission to share that art with the world and what the artist is trying to do with their life.
But it is, in the end, a narcissism that was at the center. And what the animals did for me is reverse that. That I had to nurture them.
To me, the nurturing just brought out that sense of the maternal and also that sense that it was better to give than to receive. And that, to me, is a big message of the book.
And I actually used that quote from St Francis of Assisi about it being better to give than it is to receive, and that sense of gratitude that is a very important lesson that life with these animals taught me.
And that's why I'm so involved with rescue and adoption and caring for animals in such a powerful way. Because they need our help, and in that giving, we actually do receive.
Julia Meek: You are an advocate and really do get it. Thank you for all of that. Now, the leap from dreaming to living the dream. What had to happen for that to happen?
Diana du Pont: Oh, I had to leave the land that I never thought I would leave. I had to leave my beloved California and move to the Midwest, and it was because my husband had an opportunity here.
And at first, people looked at us crazy, like, what have you done that would take you to Tulsa, Oklahoma, because that's where we went first.
And they didn't know what they were missing, as far as we were concerned. We loved Oklahoma. We were there for maybe four years, I think, and then we came to Fort Wayne, and we have found this is our home.
We found the ranch we dreamed of in California, in a farm here, and we just adore it.
Julia Meek: But between there and here, [chuckles] and all of the excitement and adventures took you--relearning, is that the right word to use for you, jumping back into the whole equestrian lifestyle?
Diana du Pont: Mmhmm. Well, what was, first of all, I wanted to maximize my horse's potential, and it became a conflict with my work, because you can't really compete and train successfully without committing to it more fully.
And the other thing Julia, is I wanted a dog. I wanted a dog so badly. And I was faced with, well, I can't do this if I'm working full time.
And so, these two forces of wanting a dog and wanting to take Blackie to his full potential, Blackie being the off-track thoroughbred repurposed for dressage, I had to leave work and work independently.
That was a big struggle. But on my 15th anniversary, working at this museum, the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, as their curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, the day after that celebration of my 15th anniversary, I gave my resignation, and I never looked back.
Julia Meek: And you knew.
Diana du Pont: I knew, and I wanted to explore this side of myself, this maternal side. And I was starting to do things.
I mean, when I got to the Midwest, I had never set foot in a Hobby Lobby, for example. [Julia chuckles] I had never set foot in a Costco. They don't have them in Santa Barbara.
I was cooking and organizing. And, I mean, I was just letting myself explore that. And one of the most fascinating things is I worked on my books.
I had hundreds of books, and I organized them in a way I had never done before. And I saw that the trajectory of my life fit this. It fit this odyssey.
Julia Meek: Your personal library, foretelling or...
Diana du Pont: it was and you, because you first you think, oh, I shouldn't have done this, or should I have done this? You know, you have doubts.
And then you see it confirmed, which made another kind of larger lesson that the steps we take in our life, they're meant to be there. Those steps are there for a reason.
Julia Meek: Follow that thought for just one second. You listened pretty much right after it started calling your name. Was it difficult to carry through with the choice that you had made?
Diana du Pont: No, in fact, it became more of a stress to be a workaholic. [both laugh] I'd be sitting in these meetings at work, you know, and I was always like, attentive.
But then I began wondering, Oh, how's Blackie doing? Oh, when's my next lesson? Oh, [laugh] how can I...and then, oh, they say, Diana, what do you think about that?
And I go, I had to snap out of it. And then I go, oh, wait a minute, that's a sign, right? That you're daydreaming about your horse in the middle of a meeting about how the exhibition is going to look.
Although I love my work. It wasn't about not loving my work. It was really about being pulled, and when I was pulled in that direction and when I was giving, because these animals require giving.
And in the giving is when I learned that there's something so much more beautiful about life.
Julia Meek: Good for you, and again, good for them. And what a revelation to have when you can turn it around and make it be or you become it, perhaps we should say.
Now, once you got back into that equestrian lifestyle and the dressage competition in particular, what was the rush for you? Can you describe that first rush?
Diana du Pont: Well, at first, it was funny, because you want to win, right? And then what happened?
This horse is so fractious, so sensitive, jumpy at every turn, that it became a challenge just to have the connection with him. That he would listen to me and be in my hand.
And if I succeeded in that, in a very showy environment, which was like the racetrack, all the trauma of the racetrack, the show environment is pretty loud and boisterous.
If I could have that harmony with him, that was the goal.
Julia Meek: You, you did know you were on the right path the second you stepped onto that path?
Diana du Pont: I did. I did, but it had nuances. The interesting thing is, the maternal evolved. It wasn't a knowledge right away.
The nurturing, as I nurtured them, there's a transition that happened.
And the crux of it is this, is that when you begin to think that you would sacrifice for this horse and for this dog in a way that you would for your own.
Then I knew I had crossed the threshold, and I created a new form of family, and I devoted myself to it. I would give them anything. I would nurture them in any way I could. I would not let them suffer. I tried to provide everything they needed.
Julia Meek: Family. Family.
Diana du Pont: It was family. I think I had to recreate not having a coherent family. I was creating my own coherent family.
Julia Meek: Which few people get the chance to do. Now fast forward to, well, when you got here, and you still are here in South Whitley, just outside of Columbia City, and a lot of people call that the equestrian hub of Northeast Indiana.
There's a love and a passion and showing and performance of horses. How do you like it there?
Diana du Pont: Oh, I feel like I landed in my dream space. Because first of all, it's an architected house by a well-known local architect, Kenneth Cole.
And the house was, I mean, we can't, we bought the house the same day. The farm. The house is in the center of the farm, and then the farm, the fields are around that.
There's a manicured garden, fields and then woods, and it's very secluded. And it was just this tenderness to want to take care of this piece of land.
Julia Meek: And where then, in that little scheme, is the Flower Farm part of things?
Diana du Pont: Oh, it's there! [laughs] We love to garden. That was the other thing we said, this is endless gardening, okay? If you get a place like this, a farm, it's endless gardening.
The prior owners, the Wolfs, who had the Wolf Mattress Factory here in town, she was very creative, and that's why the house is the way it is.
She had beautiful flower beds, and we just continued to work them. And it was like having our dream right there.
We could just go out and start to fiddle. We're like, you know, fiddlers in the garden.
Julia Meek: So, I am curious, though, Diana, when did you, with never enough time for everything, actually realize you just had to write about it all?
Diana du Pont I had the idea in California, to be honest. But I just like the academic I was, I was going to write about dressage, the art of dressage and thoroughbreds.
But then I realized it was about my personal story and finding motherhood the way I could find it. And so, then when covid happened, I really buckled down and finished the book in the fall of 2024.
But then I went through the publishing process and getting a publisher and getting it published. And it's coming out March 24-- you know, 2026.
So that just tells you the publishing process can be lengthy.
Julia Meek: Indeed. How easy did it flow from head to heart to page?
Diana du Pont: No, I struggled. I think writing is, I mean, maybe for some it's just a beautiful flow.
But no, I work at it. I'm the tortoise, okay, I'm not the hare. [Julia laughs] I'm not.
And that's the other thing I learned with horses and dogs is that it didn't matter. It wasn't the destination; it was the journey.
Julia Meek: So what was your reaction to the final project?
Diana du Pont: Oh, my! First of all, they didn't send me the advance copies until very recently, and when they came,
I mean, you open it up, and maybe it's like having a baby, no, no, no, not close, but maybe a close second! [both laugh]
When I opened up the box, and there it was, yeah. Because there's that reality. There it is, yeah, and all the struggles it took to get there, because I'm a pretty heavy self-editor.
Julia Meek: And good for you, you would have to be to have been the alpha, successful type through all of these things, through the wonderful art career, and now the animal career that you've embarked on, for sure, Diana.
And okay, now fast forward to your friendship with Humane Fort Wayne. How did that all happen?
Diana du Pont: Well, it started with-- [laughs] the farm came with cats, and I was not a cat person because I was allergic to cats.
But then the cats on the farm had to be, I wanted them to be neutered and spayed accordingly, because that's the responsible thing.
So anyway, I end up with Hope for Animals. And then, Jessica Henry Johnson, who's just a dream, she called up one day and she said she knew I wanted another lab after shadow passed.
Julia Meek: And Shadow is the love of your life, dog that came after Blackie.
Diana du Pont: Yeah, what happened is that I adopted Blackie first, and then when I left the museum, I was able to get Shadow and rescue her.
I had her till 14, and I had to say goodbye, and then I had to say goodbye to Blackie six months later,
Julia Meek: Oh, I'm so sorry.
Diana du Pont: And I was grieving. I couldn't imagine replacing. I just couldn't.
And then Jessica calls and says, I have a lab. Will you come and look at it?
And we adopted that beautiful Pascha on Good Friday, and that's why we named her Pascha.
Julia Meek: Lovely, and in the meantime, she's part of the family now.
Diana du Pont: Oh, she is the family.
Julia Meek: So, in yet another meantime, because your life has many meantimes and many courses of action in it, Diana, [chuckles] you have two book signings on the horizon. Would you tell us about them? They're pretty special.
Diana du Pont: Barnes & Noble here in Fort Wayne and across the country, really, is supporting local and regional authors, doing a really good job there.
So, they're hosting the Glenbrook, the big kind of flagship, Barnes & Noble. I'm going to have an author event, a book signing on April 11. Basically, it's from noon to three.
And then the Orchard Crossing Barnes and Noble, I'm going to be there for Mother's Day, Mother's Day weekend, meaning, so I'll be there May 9, doing a signing.
Julia Meek: How apropos, as being the Fur Mama.
Diana du Pont
[both chuckle] Oh yeah, the Fur Mama on Mother's Day. Absolutely, it's totally perfect.
So many people, their animals are part of their family. They consider their companion animals as family members.
Julia Meek: They are, yes. And okay. It seems that whatever you set your mind and heart to, you succeed.
Even so, did you have any idea that the day you got back in the saddle three decades ago was the first day of, as your subtitle says, Your Best Life?
And very last question, just what adventures might the Fur Mama's next chapter hold?
Diana du Pont: Well, what's so incredible about it is, no, absolutely not.
I had no idea I would be on a farm in the Midwest and love it, and love it here, and love the people here and love my animals here. [chuckles] I had no idea.
So, the lesson there is, you know, life happens when you're planning other things. So don't think you've got it all mapped out. Just follow that surprise and embrace it.
That's what happened to us, my husband and I, and we couldn't be happier.
And when I think about what would be next, this was my love letter to Blackie. Let's face it, he's the one who started it right?
He's the animal I adopted first.
And now that the book is done and it's out there, and it's Fur Mama, and it is a love letter to him, I can finally open my mind up and think maybe I can; I still continue to ride, but I haven't had my own horse again, and now that's a possibility.
Julia Meek: Diana du Pont is an equestrian living In Whitley County and author of Fur Mama.
Thanks for sharing your story and your passion with us, Diana, keep up the good work.
Diana du Pont: Oh, thank you, Julia, so much for having me. Bless Your Heart.
