Explosion Averted.
A few years ago, we were getting ready to host a big Sunday picnic at our house. Yard freshly mowed. Flowers planted. Tables set up. Everything dialed in.
While finishing up, I reset the horseshoe pits.
What I didn’t know?
I had just driven a steel stake straight into the gas line coming into our house.
If you’ve ever played horseshoes, you know sparks aren’t uncommon when steel hits steel. Gas leak + spark + yard full of people…That math doesn’t end well.
Sunday morning, before guests arrived, I noticed something strange.
Our propane tank was frosted over.
In the middle of July.
That didn’t make sense.
I didn’t fully understand what was happening, but I knew enough to turn the gas off and deal with it later. After the event, we discovered the leak. The frost wasn’t random.
It was a warning sign.
In business, frost shows up too.
Accounts receivable stretching longer than usual
Vendors getting paid later and later
Margins thinning
Cash getting tighter
Overhead quietly creeping
Individually, they don’t feel explosive.
But combined? They can be.
The danger isn’t the explosion.
The danger is ignoring the frost.
One of the things I love about providing fractional CFO services to business owners is the clarity it can bring. Working together, we can often see patterns before they become emergencies. To help you “turn off the gas” before a spark hits.
You don’t need panic.
You need perspective.
Because the best explosions are the ones that never happen.
-Rusty Fulling