July brought with it the usual yellow, dry grass that crunched underfoot and the necessity to water the garden and flowerbeds every day. May and June's lush foliage now drooped with despair. My old wheelbarrow missing the front wheel that had been converted to a cute flowerbed, looked bedraggled and sparse. Even the mint that usually covered every nook and cranny of its surface, had died and left dried branches and crackly leaves behind.
But after July's desert-like conditions, August has managed to bring a few weeks of reprieve. The rain greened up the grass right before our very eyes and our vegetable garden seems to be producing a hundredfold, thanks to the cool nights and dew-filled mornings.
As I was walking around the perimeter of our little property last night, I took a picture of the back of the house. As you can see, it is surrounded by trees and foliage and the grey/blue siding blends right in with the evening shadows. But what struck me as I examined the picture later, was the little heart in the sky above the pool area. The "heart" is really just some branches hanging over each other precariously and a bit of the blue sky peeping through. But the shape of a heart is visible.
That is how I feel about this little patch we call home here. People driving by don't give it a second glance as the front of the house is overshadowed by the mass of English walnut trees. But standing back, I remember what this house looked like when we first came to see it. And it wasn't love at first sight! I remember thinking that this house needed a family, someone to laugh and scream and put their stamp on it. Almost 13 years later, I feel like we may have accomplished just that!
Although my husband has done the brunt of the physical work, getting our home and property to where it is currently, has been a joint labour of love. Overgrown flowerbeds have been trimmed and weeded for years and are finally growing in a manageable fashion. The 1960's concrete fishpond, once beautiful but neglected and beyond repair, has been busted out and filled and the scarred patch of dirt where it once was, is finally grown over and green. On the house itself, decks have been added, sliding doors and windows placed and replaced to make it ours. The list is endless.
But the side field from which I took the picture, has been the biggest accomplishment of all. Once rows of neglected grapes, it had been messy and muddy, a cemetery of a former owner's dreams with big ruts dotted with broken pieces of underdrainage sticking out of the ground. Jim's months of raking by hand and continuous seeding over a decade ago, is now all but forgotten and replaced with good memories. This piece of our property has seen ATV's racing around, has been set up with rows of tables for birthday dinners, Thanksgiving lunches and high teas, as well as volleyball games and huge bonfires.
This is what country living is all about. It is about making memories. Planting new trees and sitting in garden chairs watching the tipsy cyclists ride by after visiting some wineries all around, unaware that we are laughing at their antics. It's about sitting back after hours of outside maintenance every Saturday and observing the grass mowed in tidy rows and the flowerbeds just preening with vibrant colour.
So that little heart? Yes, maybe it's a figment of my imagination. But it reflects how deeply I love living where we are. It's not a mansion. Our gardens will never be featured on garden tours or glossy magazines. But it has been a labour of love, a place where our family comes home to every day. Home is where your heart is and there is nothing more deeply satisfying than that!
Lolita Schimann Hale
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