Journey Into Home

In December 2014, we bought a property. True a story opener as any -- a handy marker for a convoluted unfolding process, without a precise inception, and perhaps without an end. Accordingly, this written record will not proceed linearly. Chronological precision doesn't much matter. Now, all points lead home.

It was a stretch of land we'd passed by regularly, for nearly two decades. Just two blocks from where we lived, halfway up a forested hillside, in a neighborhood that had gradually settled all around it -- the only remaining undeveloped lot. An acre-plus of trees and slope, perhaps unbuildable?  It had, after all, been owned before us. Others had envisioned home there; whereas, we had not seen through the trees in all those years. Until one early autumn day, it seemed quite clear: The land had been waiting for us.