Wow... I knew it had been 'a while'... but I really didn't think it has been a year since I last posted. The quick excuse is that life got busy. I started writing a weekly article for another site and eventually that was the only writing I did. THEN in September our landlord offered to sell us her house.... a dilapidated depression era farm house - and five acres. The acreage sealed the deal of course. My husband and I both have full time jobs that keep us afloat... for the most part. Sometimes his contracting work is slim pickings and what he makes when it's good isn't usually enough to easily get by when it's not. So we found our selves working on the new property at the end of the day til sometimes 1am. And the repairs and improvements were all out of pocket above and beyond what we had to pay out for expenses normally anyways. It's been a crazy year.
Yes, we are still married... yes we have moved in... no the house is not done. It looks nice inside... except for the depression era kitchen with two cupboards and one counter that hasn't been touched, and the main bathroom which we have torn apart down to the lapboard with only a nice new toilet... but no shower and no sink or water otherwise...and various other corners and nooks that have been deemed not immediately important. We sanded the real wood floors and thought we had done good. But re-staining and sealing them was one of those bigger expenses that had to wait And wait. And wait. And we couldn't wait to move in any longer. So our floors are in limbo. I'm not even sure they were sanded enough. I still see shine. I don't think real wood sanded down is supposed to shine. Oh well! All the better since we are living on them now anyways. But someday we are going to have to move out- so we can do our floors.
And that's just the short version of the story about the inside. I haven't mentioned the 'Jacuzzi room ( closet ) that was never finished and had become an indoor jungle. That we just sealed off. There is now a wall where there was once a door to a Jacuzzi room. Now we just have to rip it off the corner of the house and re-side. Nor have I mentioned the dormer rooms upstairs that my daughter has closed off due to the hole in the floor where my husband borrowed the wood flooring to repair damage to the floor in the Man Cave. The hole in the kitchen ceiling where a stove chimney used to run? Well that was going to be a dumb waiter up to my daughters room. Someday. Maybe. Today, it's just a hole up to the attic. The well...? I don't even want to think about it. It seems to work. For now. The property has visually had about as much improvement as the painted walls of the house interior. Trimming some trees and bushes makes such a difference. Now the pine tree limbs don't touch the ground and you can walk under them. It's amazing the difference.
I can't say removing a good number of rusted out classic cars and various farm implements from the black berries has really made much of a difference though... I mean- since you couldn't really see them anyways. We don't own a tractor. Well, that is unless you count the non- working one that was on the property. But have no fear, hubby says he can make it go. Until then though, we have a ridiculously generous neighbor who has offered his time and his fancy tractor to push back a few areas of berries. Three of the 5 acres are still covered in them, but we have a garden now thanks to him. Albeit - a late late started one. What can I say, no matter how rough the going gets, we are optimists!
However... there are a few things that really put a damper on those lofty spirits. Things like, no highspeed internet. And no cell service. Having to get a land line once again is like having to use a brick car phone. That's what you deal with when you live in the country, right? But I'm only a mile outside of town! Every now and then I find a signal. And then a breeze moves in and it's gone. Maybe a cloud goes by... maybe an airplane. Maybe a cow farts... I don't know and I can't explain it, but poof and it's gone. I am the queen of unfinished conversations, which I guess is better than being the queen of no reply.
It all brings home my own aversion to change. These things that are happening for us are so exciting. Our first home... our own land. Providing for ourselves from our own harvests. I'm going to have horses, chickens and goats, probably rabbits too. We have an orchard (and all the black berries we want). But... I don't know. And that's just it maybe... I don't know. I don't know what I'm doing! I'm the type who has to do it to learn it but I'm also the type who don't want to do it if she can't do it well. It's frustrating- all this new stuff. But it's the kind of frustration that you easily sweep under the rug along with never ending farm dirt. You just have to hope that everything else in your life remains a constant. You cling to and long for that confidence in stability. However, this is a big change. Some changes make your comfortable routine of a life suddenly busy and always rearranging and it's hard to hold up your end of that stability. It's what you need the most and it's the hardest to give at times and to grasp at others. Change isn't something that just happens in a moment and then moves on. Just when you think you are getting used to it, there are domino effect changes waiting in the wings. Sometimes I feel like I must be the strongest person in the world to not let it get to me. Sometimes I feel like the weakest person in the world because I can not stop the changes. And sometimes I feel like the loneliest person in the world because I can't imagine any one could understand all the ways in which things have had to change. Please understand, I do not want or mean to complain about this great blessing. But as always... I seek to be understood and I some how always had this weird notion that someone out there... just might.
