Just over one year ago- May 20, 2018- we sat on one side of a lawyer’s conference table, wondering if we were making a huge mistake. We were about to sign on the dotted line to take over a 230 acre farm in the middle-of-nowhere Vermont, after weeks of complicated negotiations with the remaining members of the family who previously owned the home. This include a motley crew of lawyers- including one bearing British documents literally sealed with a wax stamp- and several realtors who were hoping against all odds that this house would finally be sold after years on the market. We were the ones crazy enough to take the plunge.
After it was ours, we walked through the house, still getting lost in a layout that made no sense after years of additions. The kitchen still had its 1950s Nutone range. Layers of wallpaper were upstairs and down. The barn was full of mice. But it was our Nutone range. Our wallpaper. Our mice.
No doubt, it will be- and already has been- a lot of work. But in so many ways, this place is the realization of a childhood dream. Gentle rolling hills for horses, chickens, dogs, and cat to explore, surrounded by beautiful Vermont forests. It is so, so quiet here.
A year has flown by, and we’ll get to that. But as we pause and think about where we are today, and where we were on June 5, 2018, there’s one major difference. Last week, we lost the best dog we’ll ever have. Delia was suffering from the effects of either a stroke or severe idiopathic vestibular disease. There was simply nothing that we could do but send her on to be reunited with her old friend Jimmy Carter. We miss them both terribly, and things are too quiet around here without her big Muppet feet tick-tick-ticking across the hardwood floors or her tail wagging the fronds off the ferns. There will never be another dog like Delia. But I have no doubt that the copious amounts of her white fur that floated like a cloud as she moved from room to room will be nestled in the nooks and cranies of this house as long as we are. In that way, she’ll be with us as we continue with this adventure.
