Monday, August 26, 2013



Life is strange, the paths we take, and are sometimes forced to take.  In the late eighties when my mother in law came from China to live with us, we gave her our bedroom and moved to the rec room.  She'd had dreams of streets paved with gold and was very disappointed.  I tried to tell her how well her son was doing, but it didn't meet her dreams.  They spent several hours together every night.  In the event, she was telling him he could do better than what he had, than me.  He tried to start his own business on top of a very demanding full time job.  I was working 16 hours a day on a new crafts business and both of us working against a recession.  She left the next summer for her daughter's wedding in China.  When she returned, my marriage was dead, and he was living with a new woman who'd been helping him with the side business.  She hated the new woman and her kid, and finally decamped permanently for China.  Josh married the new lady a few years later, had a little girl and left her less than a year after the marriage.  Both businesses went belly up in Bush's little recession, I sold the house and tried California, and was back in a year, and ended up here.

The summer I bought the land with my last $20,000, planning to build, I recall sitting in the grove where my living room now is, and finally just turning it over to the Universe.  I had $60 in the bank, I was living in a tent made from blue tarps clipped to the frame of my craft booth and winter was making itself present every night in the 30+ degrees I was getting regularly.  It was perfectly clear that I was *not* going to be under roof before winter was fully present.  I believe that my exact words were: I have come as far as I can on my own.  If You want this to happen, it's Yours. 

Evidently, the Universe did want it to happen because literally within a few *hours* things began to turn.  That afternoon a stranger drove down the road with a message from John's store to call my ex.  And the wheels were put into motion that gave me a place to live for the winter and support to do so.  Before winter came my friends and relatives had helped me put in the telephone poles that were to be the foundation of this home.  It was to be the coldest winter of my life, before or since--minus 28º temps and the biggest snow storm (3+ feet).  By Christmas Eve the next winter I moved in to stay.  And have to say, it's been the most interesting score of years I've lived so far.

I'd hoped to live to see it finished.  I won't.  But Lord Willing, my son will.  I hope so.











5 comments:

Jo_in_Vermont said...

beautiful! thank you for sharing the backdrop and the pic. xo

listener said...

The photo makes me see how wonderful your hard work was and how well it blossomed! You're made of good stuff, puddle. ♥

listener said...

The photo of the house makes me see how hard you worked and how well it has blossomed! You are made of good stuff, puddle! ♥

listener said...

Wrote two posts, but don't see them. Silly Blogger!

puddle said...

Sorry about that--my phone line was out so I couldn't okay the comments.