Notes from Our Last Trip

I've been writing about the history of Woodman's Lee in the last few posts. This post is about our most recent trip.

We drove up to WL from South Carolina for Thanksgiving (Nov 2013).

When we arrived it was simply beautiful, even if the cold took our breath away - or makes us inhale less deeply. It was hovering around zero F, unseasonably cold.

In the mornings the beagle (W) and I would amble down to the depleted beaver pond and check the all-important water level. It remained down a couple of feet, after S and I cleared the culverts with the potato rakes.

Unless I had a face covering it's too cold to press on to the road so we'd typically return to the cabin, where it was usually a bit under 70F. W burrowed into the futon and I'd begin the morning chores.

We had a nice Thanksgiving dinner at WL (I made pistou). We boycotted Black Friday as usual and we didn't venture out all weekend. When we did, the world seemed so large - but it was only tiny Jay. How we quickly become accustomed to our surroundings and then notice the differences when we reenter 'normalcy'.

I'm not concerned about our ability to survive up there. I think we can do it without going broke or crazy or killing ourselves. We've proved out the wood stove and well water so we have heat and water. I think we can build a nice barn, put in a garden, get a tractor and improve the property. I don't mean improvements as defined by developers and greedy people. I want to take care of the land and heal it. I'd like to remove the scrub and give the trees space to grow. We won't build much, we don't need the space and the increased taxes.