After months of living in a temporary state of flux, I am finally home.
It's a very plain, yellow brick house. The yard is even plainer. Total tabula rasa. A blank slate.
There's a park right across the street, surrounded by woods. I'm learning the trees and the lay of the land, as I walk there several times a day with my good canine companion. I've seen rabbits, squirrel, and smelled a skunk. I've heard a lot of different birds whose voices I don't yet know, along with the more familiar robins, chickadees, sparrows, crows, woodpeckers and bluejays.
Johnny was frenetic at first, eager to absorb and know all the new smells, sights and sounds. There are four dogs and a pig (a sweet, gentle dwarf pig) next door. The first night we were here, the dogs and Johnny barked back and forth as if they were having a conversation. Now he doesn't bark at them anymore. They are our neighbors. He has calmed down and now he walks nicely beside me instead of trying to lunge ahead through the park.
I transplanted some of the roses that survived the demolition of my old house. While my sister and I were digging up the yellow climber, we found some gladiola bulbs (are they bulbs or gorms or something different?) and I put them near the roses. I have potted herbs waiting to go into the ground as soon as I decide where to put the herb garden. Several garbage bags of ice-plants are also waiting on my plans. In the next few days there will be a consultation with an expert landscaper/gardener to advise on what to put where.
Never had a lawn before. Don't like the idea of so much upkeep and maintenance just for grass. Seems pointless. I'm visualizing a knot garden that will take up most of the front yard. Ideally it will change with each of the four seasons. The backyard will be a large vegetable garden next year and of course the herb garden, but I have to wait until the deck is added on to the back of the house before I start planning that. Trying to get rid of as much "lawn" as I can and fill the space with gardens instead. The knot garden may end up being as labor-intensive as a lawn but I'd rather spend my time and energy on grooming something meaningful to me instead of being a slave to a blank, green expanse.
I have the two upstairs rooms to myself. One is the bedroom and on the other side is a room I am slowly making into a scriptorium. The loss of my books, journals and accompanying trinkets was the most painful part of the fire that destroyed the old house.
Here, this afternoon, in this quiet neighborhood on top of the tallest hill for miles around, I am starting to feel truly at home again. I slept until 9 this morning for the first time since I don't remember when. I'm relaxing and spreading my wings. I'm a different person now - a Phoenix - yet I am more than ever who I always was.
Rising from the ashes....
