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I have spent a lot of time writing about what we left behind in Ca:

Family 

Friends

My hometown 

The redwoods

Our lives as we knew them 

I feel it is time to move on and give thanks today for where I woke up this morning.

Home.

We began looking for property the moment we got to this side of the world.  I cannot count how many houses we entertained in that two and a half years but it had to be close to a hundred.   It was for this reason that I was completely jaded the day I unwittingly met our homestead for the first time.

The only reason we even looked at this property was because there was an old organic farm in the area we were coming up to see.  We thought we would look at some comps.  Even though this house was nothing we thought we wanted.  We had gotten it into our heads that we were going to buy an old farm house of some sort and fix it up.

Something with lots of land and room for improvement.  Ok, a lot of the time we looked into places that were completely dilapidated BUT on established orchards and we thought “this could work.”

Looking back I realize this was idealistic and a bit naive.  We would never have had the time and money to fix anything!

When we saw the listing that said “DO NOTHING BUT SIT BACK and enjoy this sunny home…” We thought “well that’s not for us but we will look anyway.  What’s one more house.”

When I drove up the pine lined driveway everything changed.  I was early and got to meet the owner before he took off.  A smiling man with two dogs, so far so good.

As he left and the sound of gravel under his tires quieted I was enchanted by the calm silence.  Bird songs of all types surrounded me and I walked about the private bit of property astounded by the feeling it evoked.  Thinking “I hope the other place is like this.”

More than half the land was still virgin forest and there was a trail that ran up to the top of the mountain (not our land but uninhabited) and over looked Great East Lake.

The house is small (Only a little over 1000 sq feet) but after living on the boat and then out of our truck for months that really wasn’t a big deal.

When my love arrived, we looked at the house (briefly) and decided to walk the loop trail that goes from one side of the land to the other.  It wasn’t long after we were enveloped under the trees that we turned to each other and knew without words, that we were home.

This is what we had been looking for.  Not a place, but a feeling.

It was everything we wanted but in our focus on the other property (with 6 acres) we pushed this aside thinking we were on the right track and for sure the other house would be just what we wanted.

It was not.  Just another ‘almost’ to add to the list.

The little blue house in Acton stole our hearts.  The town of Acton, Maine sealed the deal.  With only a little over 2,000 residence, a town hall, library and fire department within the town limits it is a small place indeed.  We have to visit neighboring towns to get substantial supplies of groceries.

Fine by me, because when I get home it looks like this.

Simple and calm.

We had made a promise when we left to find our oldest dog, Honey a place to retire.  Somewhere she could roam as she wanted without neighbors and traffic.   After her life of abandonment and upheaval, she deserved a place to be her own.   This is her domain.

She is our matriarch and we have done her proud.

After those years of searching, our requirements came down to a two simple things:

Land (=space.)

Peace.

I think it is because of these modest but unbendable goals that we got:

a place to be married.

Raise the kids/Jedi.

Care for the animals.

Get/make more animals.

We can see the milky-way every night and be totally surrounded by nature.

We got what we wanted.   I am grateful we did not get stuck in our preconceptions about what it would look like.  Thus missing our dream because it came in a different package than the one we anticipated.

There is great happiness here and we are blessed to be a part of it.

Be well and thanks for reading!