The Times They Are A-Changing

 

I'm a really big planner. I thought I had my retirement plans pretty much set, and I certainly had no clue that only a year and a half into it those plans, and my life, would change so radically.

Apricot blossoms

 

First of all, I will not be planting a garden this year. I have raised much of my family's food for the last 40+ years and in spring, summer, and fall my life has revolved around planning crops, planting, harvesting, and preserving. I may grow a few things in pots, but it won't be in Minnesota.

 

 

 

 

Nanking cherry blossoms

 

Second, I thought that I would live out the rest of my life right here in Minnesota, in the same house I have lived in for the last 28 years, near my daughters and grandchildren, sister and brother-in-law, and dear friends.

 

 

 

 

 

 

And third, it was my dream to travel to places local and foreign, dreaming that had sustained me through all the ups and downs of years of a demanding career.

I was quite satisfied with this life, doing all these things, happily reading all the books I'd had to put off when I was teaching, babysitting grandchildren, traveling near home, taking one big trip a year.

 

What's that saying, life is what happens while you are busy making plans?

I never in my wildest dreams imagined that the young man I started my adult life with would return to finish my life with me. And of course, now I can't imagine anything that would make me happier!

We were partners, part of each others' lives for 7 or 8 years, built a house together in the Carolina mountains with our own four hands, lived a life few could imagine. But then he began to yearn for the Big City and a career other than goat milker and carpenter and I'm a country girl and couldn't imagine a life in the city. We parted ways, each going on to raise a family 1300 miles apart, losing track of each other completely. Then, thanks to the wonders of technology, social media, and his extreme persistence, he tracked me down, and the rest is, well, my own personal Last Tango in Halifax story.

So, I will be continuing to write my blog but soon most of my stories will be from the Low Country of South Carolina rather than the prairies of Minnesota, from a little house on an island with a view of a tidal flat and pluff mud outside my back porch, with two big dogs at my feet and my cat probably permanently hidden under a bed. (Rosie has never met a dog, much less two BIG ones. She will soon.)

 

I do hope y'all will come along!

 

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