Twenty-Five Feet.
The splash is never as loud as you think it’s going to be.
She walked right past me.
Soaking wet. Dripping water across the living room floor like she’d just crawled out of the ocean. Fur matted flat against her body, tail dragging, paws leaving little puddles with every step.
My cat, Lyra, had been in the pool.
I was sitting twenty-five feet away. Laptop open. Deep in whatever I was working on. I didn’t hear a thing. Not the splash. Not whatever happened after. Not the part where a six-year-old special needs cat on palliative care assessed an entirely new situation, one she’d never been in before, found the step, and got herself out.
I heard none of it.
What I got was the aftermath. A drenched cat walking past me with a look that said everything. I handled it. No thanks to you.
She didn’t stop. She didn’t meow. She just kept walking to the back bedroom, where she began the meticulous business of drying herself off. Lick by lick. On her terms. Without my help, because clearly I’d proven I wasn’t going to be any.
Here’s what you need to know about Lyra.
She’s a homebody. While our other cat treats the backyard like his personal wilderness, Lyra is the one who sticks her head out the door and watches from the threshold. Cautious. Deliberate. She knows her limits, which is exactly why she has the freedom to be outside when I’m home and the door is open.
She’s also special needs. Severe seizures. The kind that require serious medication and an integrative protocol we’ve built alongside her prescriptions. It’s kept her going longer than anyone expected. Last year, I didn’t think we’d make it to Christmas. She rallied.
We are on borrowed time, and we both know it. So when she wants to go outside and sniff some grass, feel the sun, maybe pretend she can still chase a gecko? She gets to do that. Because the alternative, locking her inside to keep her “safe” while she slowly disappears, that’s not living. That’s just dying with better optics.
I can only imagine what happened. She must have spotted a gecko. That particular temptation, the one thing that could make her break her own pattern, and she went for it. Threw caution out the window. Chased it straight into the pool.
And then, completely alone, in a situation she’d never been in before, she figured it out.
Twenty-five feet away, I didn’t know any of it was happening.
That’s exactly how businesses fail.
Not with a loud crash. Not with some dramatic moment where you see it coming and brace for impact. Quietly. Incrementally. The water turns. The clients go. The reputation shifts, and you’re still sitting there thinking everything is fine because nobody’s made it your emergency yet.
I think about a pool service company we used.
When we moved in, several neighbors on the street used the same company. Part of how we were introduced to them was that relatives of the owners actually live on our street. It felt like a natural fit. Things were fine at first. Weekly service, chemical levels good, pool looked great. Then the gaps started. I’d come home and wonder: was the pool even cleaned this week? I’d message them. The response was always the same: Yep, all good.
So I took their word for it.
The water started to turn. Levels were off. I couldn’t tell you the last time someone had actually shown up and done the work they were billing me for. Finally, out of frustration, I messaged a neighbor further up the street, someone I mostly only see driving by. Their response? They’d let the company go months earlier. Same story. Chemicals off, inconsistent service, no-shows, zero communication.
And then the detail that stopped me: the neighbors who canceled live right next door to the relatives. They had to have that conversation, the awkward, there’s-no-good-way-to-say-this conversation, with people connected to them by family. And they had it anyway. Because the service had dropped far enough that it was worth the discomfort.
Here’s the other part: the company they switched to charges more per month. They made the switch without hesitation.
That tells you everything. Price was never the issue. It was never about the money. It was about whether the work was actually being done and whether anyone bothered to prove it.
When I offered to share what I knew about elevating the customer experience, the response from the pool company was immediate: Oh, we’re good. Everyone is happy. We have plenty of business.
Until you don’t.
If you are in the service business, and I spent years building one from zero to seven figures, there are things that are non-negotiable. And they’re not complicated.
Every service gets documentation. Every visit gets proof. Every client gets communication and gratitude.
The technology to do this isn’t just available. It’s expected. Your client should never have to wonder if you showed up. The answer should already be in their inbox before the thought crosses their mind.
And here’s the math most service business owners get wrong: they think in terms of one job. One visit. One month.
That pool service was $150 a month. Multiply that by twelve. That’s $1,800 a year, per client. Now multiply that by four. Because it wasn’t just us. Four homes on the same block quietly let this company go. Same story across every single one.
Four homes. Same street. That’s $7,200 a year walking out the door, and that’s just the base rate. Before seasonal extras. Before repairs. Before referrals.
Here’s what makes it worse: a tight cluster of clients on one block is a service business’s dream. Minimal drive time. Maximum efficiency. You can run four stops in the time it takes to drive across town for one. That route wasn’t just revenue. It was profitable revenue. The kind operators spend years trying to build.
They didn’t lose four pool cleanings. They lost $7,200 a year, a perfectly efficient route, and the referral network of an entire street. And they earned a reputation they can’t outrun, because people talk. Especially in neighborhoods. Especially in Florida.
The splash is never as loud as you think it’s going to be.
Lyra got herself out of the pool.
She found the step. She walked inside, dripping. She handled a situation she’d never been in, alone, while I sat twenty-five feet away completely unaware.
She’s a fighter. She’s been proving that her whole life. But that’s not a business strategy.
You don’t get to sit twenty-five feet away from your clients, your operations, your reputation and wait for something to climb out on its own. Sometimes it’s completely silent. Sometimes the only evidence is the trail of water across the floor and a look that tells you everything you missed.
By then, the hard part is already over. The question is whether your business handled it, or whether it didn’t.
A note on outdoor cats: Lyra and Houston have access to a fully enclosed, secured backyard, and only when I’m home with the door open. Our fence and backyard were intentionally designed with the cats in mind to give them safe outdoor time. They are never outside unsupervised, and they are never allowed to roam freely.
I am not an advocate for letting cats roam the neighborhood. The risks are real and the statistics are not good. If you want to give your cat the gift of fresh air and sunshine, and you should, it matters, look into catios. They’re having a moment for good reason. A safe outdoor enclosure purpose-built for cats gives them everything they need without the dangers that come with unrestricted outdoor access. Do your research, build it right, and give them the world on your terms.