Main Street News

“It’s not how old you are, it’s how you put in the time,” Michael Bucci said. At an age when many have retired, he is still putting in time at his Tomorrow, Tomorrow Sanctuary and Healing Center in Livingston, finding ways to help children and animals. 

The farm name comes from a child’s optimism, the song “Tomorrow” in the musical “Annie”.

Bucci’s first experience with animals was as a child, visiting an uncle and aunt whose neighbor had two horses. “I can still smell them…” he trailed off. About buying his daughter her first horse on her tenth birthday, “Needless to say it became an obsession.”

“All I really wanted was to work with animals and kids,” he said, telling that years ago while an electrician working on a therapy pool at Blythedale Children’s Hospital in Westchester County, “Kids would come in, in wheelchairs, on gurneys,” to watch. “They started a game, when I’d go up into the ceiling to work, they’d knock the ladder down.” Then, a raccoon showed up, “They loved it, I’d buy rolls and pick pieces off to feed it.”

Michael Bucci feels fortunate to have had great relationships with his animals

Connecting kids and horses

Connecting kids and horses, he said, goes back over 50 years, through his horse and buggy rental business in Westchester County, “At weddings, children would especially enjoy that. It was magical.”

Bucci had a profitable towing business in the New York City area, but when his daughter went to veterinary school, “I figured I gotta get out of here and do something with my life with a purpose.”

So, in 1998, he got out, to Pine Plains for two years and then “Found this place.” 

He started taking in horses slated for slaughter and putting them together with autistic and developmentally challenged children, and, “I fell in love with the land and animals and kids.” He has taken in over 100 horses over the years, but having just re-homed six of them is now down to only a few.

  Many, he said, come from local breeders, giving them up for various reasons. He laughed, remembering that once, “I went to Tractor Supply to get grain, got home and someone had dumped horses at the farm.” 

“No games, just animals” at Tomorrow Tomorrow Sanctuary and Healing Center

Goats and pumpkins, too

Bringing new animals in can be a challenge of its own sort. Once, when some new, smaller goats arrived, the current resident ones stood in front of the barn, “Yelling!” Then, there was, “A big celebration, and the next morning they were all sleeping in a big circle together.” 

Bucci’s stories abound. He talked about taking ponies to fundraisers, and bringing thousands of pumpkins from Fix Farm to a gallery at 415 Warren Street, for youngsters who might not have one. Pumpkins lined up on the sidewalk were grabbed so quickly that he finally

suggested just piling them all in the parking lot next door, where they did not stay for long.

He recalled Bard College contacting him, saying they had two girls from St. Peterburg they would like to bring to the farm. “They didn’t say Russia, I thought it was St. Petersburg, Florida,” he laughed. The girls were raised in the city and knew nothing about horses or goats, and were afraid. In spite of the language barrier, within an hour and a half, they were out in the field, playing with the horses. 

Another time, a girl from a city in Pakistan had come to the farm and was afraid to get out of the vehicle because, “She was afraid of that much grass in one spot. I took a goat over and soon she was petting it. The next time there, she was in the grass.”

Marveling at relationships animals can form, he told, “We recently got a cow, she was in a big herd that got pink eye. She got pushed aside on treatments and was almost blind. So, this goat, with one ear, took on the chore of taking care of this cow, leads her around. The night she got here, the goat took her into the barn, full of girders and all, and kept deflecting her from those girders, wouldn’t let her run into anything,” he paused, blinking, “It was beautiful to watch.”

Goats, horses, cats, dogs, cows and kids find sanctuary at Tomorrow Tomorrow

It’s all about great relationships

Bucci says he has been lucky to have great relationships with great animals, “Gotta make it work, for kids.”

The animals are all free range, which he said keeps the horses really relaxed. This helps the whole approach with youngsters, keeping everything slow, relaxed, making them more confident. “Animals are tremendous therapists,” he said.

“Kids come to the farm, there’s no games, just animals. It’s a good life, all about kids and animals.”

Teaming with now-retired Hudson school teacher Lisa Foranda, “She started to bring kids to the farm every week. It was magical.  She said, ‘they need something to do’, and I said, ‘They got something to do, just let them hang around’. Some of the children had been abused and were reticent with people, but they always related to the animals,” he mused.

Unfortunately, the program had to stop due to costs of bussing the students to the farm.

Bucci’s newest project is educating people, especially children, on the importance of pollinators. Towards this, he hopes to organize a Pollinators Week, including a parade, in Hudson. 

The farm also offers Hipcamp, for the family to bring a camper or pitch a tent, unplug and enjoy nature. The forest therapy program is mainly tuned to children with emotional or life situations, but open to everyone who wants to unwind with nature on hiking trails through the woods.

Michael Bucci keeps moving towards his goal, “I want to do something at the end of my life to show hope for kids and the future.” 

To learn more about Tomorrow, Tomorrow Sanctuary, please visit their website at tomorrowtomorrowsanctuary.org.