Surprised by a parade.

I was just down to our county seat running errands. I came up to a cross street and was stopped by a parade.

Hmm. No major holidays, no school competitions. The short row of participants included several tractors, a float informing us not to use slow moving vehicle signs on mailboxes, an old time music band, and a group of young beribboned ladies doing the queen wave.

Aha! Must be Dairy Days.

Bittersweet

Except for one year in paradise and one in purgatory, I have lived my entire life in New York. That much time, that many memories, make for many mixed feelings about the move. There is much I will miss and some things I am glad to leave behind.

I will not miss our sad excuse for soil..

I will not miss the weather.

And certainly not the taxes.

But there are more things I will miss.

The scenery.

Our clawfoot bathrub.

Friends (and our new library).

And family.

Dear future Indiana friends and neighbors



Chenango County, NY


Dear future Indiana friends and neighbors,

We are moving here from New York. And we've heard that you're worried we'll suffer from culture shock, miss the hustle and bustle and bright lights of the Big Apple.

We are from New York...UPSTATE New York. A very different beast than the City.

We're from a county with more cows than people, our "town" has a population of about 700. Our county seat is the only city in the county and has a population of not quite 7,000. The nearest grocery store is 15 miles away, the nearest mall 40.

A night on the town means going to the fire station's spaghetti supper fund raiser or the nearby motorcycle bar (snowmobiles in the winter). Traffic jams are deer or cows or the occasional escaped goat crossing the road.


We tell people we're an hour from everything--the "big" cities of Binghamton or Syracuse, an interstate highway, a Starbucks. There are no art museums, ethnic restaurants (does Italian count?), or major league sports within spittin' distance. Heck, we can't even get cable.

We can see the Milky Way at night, hear the crickets and coyotes, watch fireflies.

We're moving to Washington County, Indiana--rural farm country. The county seat has a population of just over 6,000. We've been warned there are coyotes around our place and the deer wander into the yard. There are no streetlights on our road which is mostly gravel and we're about 2 miles from the volunteer fire department which holds ham dinners.

Culture shock? We think we'll fit right in.

The ballad of Woodchuck Acres

I've wanted a place in the country since the 1970s. I devoured the old Mother Earth News, the originals, back when it was raw and scrappy.


I wanted a place in the country. But my husband didn't.


And there were jobs and college and a baby and more college and mid-life crises (yes, plural) and even more college and a career.


Until finally it fell into place and in 2002 we moved to McDonough and started to turn our 2 acres in a homestead.


We gardened, dug up rocks, got chickens, dug up more rocks, built sheds, installed a woodstove, got goats and bees. And did I mention the rocks?


Neighbors brought us venison, the worm guy stopped to introduce himself, we helped open a local library branch, went to fire station spaghetti suppers. Tom established his guitar studio and got a great church job. I even ran a small csa from the produce I grew. We loved it here.


But all things end. And it's time to move on. The prospect of starting over is exciting, scary, and will add grey hairs to my head. The cons probably outweigh the pros. Not a smart move, risky in uncertain times, irresponsible.


I can't wait!!

Changes

Woodchuck Acres was supposed to be our final home.

Growing old together on our two acres of rocks and weeds, living the good life in the country, embracing our twilight years in the serenity of rural Chenango County and all of that bullcrap.

Which doesn't really explain why I found myself in early February driving around southern Indiana with a realtor.

Let's just say Life Changes.

So, here we are well within spittin' distance of Social Security, about to leave this:

For this:

We've got some work ahead of us!