Morning Pages ~ 20 March ’20

DREAMING IS FREE

It is good again to have a dream: We will be able to start a symbolic (if not a vastly productive) garden at The Other Place. It was preying on me–that we would be helpless and dependent there compared to our relative independence on Goose Creek. No wood heat. No water without power. No garden until year two.

So I asked permission to till up a patch to start enjoying the full days of sunlight and warmth we will have there that we have not had here. We give up much to move away from here, but we make some gains, too, and a garden whose soil warms before June is one benefit.

I will begin carrying over the tomato cages, T-posts and cattle panels I will use to make a crude 8 x 24 foot enclosure. A narrow fenced area seems to make it harder for deer to jump in. Chicken wire around the bottom will keep the rabbits out. There is a spot near the house with access to well water that gets good south sun and is protected by planted evergreens from the north wind.

We have a plan. We imagine continuity in the transition. We have hope, at least of vegetable life the way it used to be, if not our own. For cats or carrots, Coronavirus is not a thing. I will choose to be cat-minded when I can get away with it, and curl up–in my imagination–in front of the future wood stove that is not. Yet.

And regarding the water: Yes it is possible to retrofit an existing well (that is dependent on electricity) with a manual pump. We have some local folk who have offered their set-ups for us to look at (when people are at ease around people again) or the actual Y2K-holdover hardware. This will work out, and might be something we can begin to set in motion before taking possession over there on June 1.

The other missing piece in our anticipated new setting is wood heat. This might not get done until Winter Number 2. It might not get done at all if our former nest egg continues to be poached and scrambled into oblivion. We knew the move was going to be a financial challenge. And that was BC–before CoronaVirus.

But we can dream for free.