Fast forward to 2020. Not that I love the year 2020. It has been a bear. A really bitchy, fully enraged momma bear kind of year. I was so glad to put 2019 to rest and start a new year. But before 2020 barely got started, we get COVID!!
One of the oddities of being in the so-called “sandwich generation” is that I have growing children at home while also tending to my aging parents. I did not consider that particular outcome when I deliberately postponed the start of my own family until we had a secure financial situation and our first home. Anyhoo, in 2020, we were going to celebrate the first of two big “Happy 80th” birthday celebrations, with my dad’s being the first. He was flying out to Seattle in June, as was my brother and his family from California, and we were all going to spend a full week together on the beautiful and sunny Olympic Peninsula.
And then we weren’t going to do that. And we weren’t going to see each other at all. And it was making me more and more anxious and sad, particularly since the last time I saw my father in person stretched to almost a full calendar year. That last visit is one I described in my post The Farm: First Look.
I had already been dealing with an accumulation of longing for home and being closer to my father and his wife. My husband and I drove to Seattle in 1993 in a Honda Civic hatchback with 7 cats and an African grey parrot, pulling the tiniest U-Haul trailer they make but still only being able to go 45 mph up the larger mountains. I should eventually post about that trip, but I digress!! Bottom line is that each year, that ache and longing grew more sharp and difficult to ignore.
Over the course of several discussions with my husband and eventually my father, I slowly hatched a plan whereby I would take a month-long road trip to see my father in the month of October. I cannot describe the sense of relief I felt when I realized that I would be able to see my father again for the first time since Thanksgiving 2019.
I slow down to turn right onto Zero Road to head to my dad’s place, and there the farm sits. I decide to continue straight, just as I had almost a year ago in November, and drive past to take a look. Imagine my surprise and delight when I see the For Sale signs still present. I slow down so much that a woman pulls around me. She must have seen my out of state license plates, so she rolls down her window and asks if I am lost. I apologize profusely for my rubbernecking and drive on to my father’s place.
That evening, I tell them that the place is still for sale, and I start to look up information about it online. There were three separate listings – one for the original 113 acres, and then two newer ones that listed the 14 acres with the house, barns and outbuildings separately from 40 pasture acres with lake. My eyes lit up, because those 40 acres are gorgeous and the price was within reason. We all agreed that evening that we’d like to see the property, and so I emailed the agent to request a showing. We soon had an appointment for Monday, October 19th. Little did I know how life-changing that showing was going to be.
If you enjoy my posts, please let me know. Kind and gentle feedback appreciated!! My plan is for this blog to be my online diary where I can record the amazing transformation taking place in my life.
~Namaste~
The Feminine Farmer 