For the first time in my life, I am home. I’ve never really felt like I have had a home. Everything always has seemed… like a transition… or something somebody would take away… or exclude me from. I’m sure some of you relate to this kind of situation.
When the pandemic hit, I was living in a temporary apartment in Salem Massachusetts. My next door neighbors had wild parties on weeknights, and I even saw them fighting the police outside my window. I knew I needed to move and wanted to get as far away from my old life as possible, hopefully somewhere rural that would feel like home.
Fast forward to Covid and there was mass exodus from cities. I was searching desperately online and driving by homes that were listed for sale in all sorts of places… Southern Maine, North Shore Massachusetts, New Hampshire… and one listing kept popping up. We finally decided to take a look and as soon as I walked out the back door, I said this is the one. I hadn’t even looked upstairs or at the basement or at the water report, but I knew in my heart this was where I needed to be.
I have worked remotely since March, 2019 and will be soon leaving this view for 3 days a week. The woods have become my refuge and my friend. On our small acreage, we host fireflies and copious amounts of little brown bats (and mosquitoes) during the summer, and a family of barred owls. I’ve seen fox, possum, deer, raccoon, skunk, ermine and there is a bobcat who roams the property behind ours as well. I’m up to 45 species of birds identified from my window alone, and spotted a species of bumblebee I’ve never seen in person foraging on my own flowers this summer.
I love this small house and am slowly writing out how I manage the property, respect the property and the beautiful things I see just out my back door. I treasure every rainstorm, every foggy evening through the woods, every rainbow cresting over the roof, and even the murder of crows who remind me to bring peanuts outside for them daily.
