Starting to settle in

The balcony/loft (haven’t decided what to call it yet) will be my domain. My husband can use the sanctuary for anything he wants, whether it’s bagpipe practice, woodworking, a restaurant, or meditation hall, but the balcony is mine. He is always complaining in our current house that my stuff is always in his face, so if I can consolidate all my hobbies into the balcony, it will eliminate that problem. There is room there for my instruments, writing desk, sewing and needlepoint supplies, looms, and books. There’s even room for a day bed that I can sprawl on to read, which could serve as a space for overnight guests as well.  I have plans to hang my grandpa’s horse collar on a wall (which has never found a good home here in my current house), and my needlepoint tapestry, and all my warping boards and weaving paraphernalia.

The loft has a great five-foot-wide round window that I call the Eye of Horus. I will replace its cross-hatched single panes with one great clear window that I can see the sky from (I might even install a telescope. It’s marvellously dark here at night). I will ensure I can open it for fresh air, and the writing desk will be on wheels so I can move it to get right up into the space. I picture myself churning out great, inspired manuscripts beneath its light. 

My husband and son and I discussed how we should let our other sons know about our church. Maybe invite them to Thanksgiving dinner, just giving them the directions and not telling them we own the place until they actually arrive. Maybe casually mention that we’re going to the “cottage” for the weekend. Oh, didn’t you know we owned a cottage? Did we never take you there as a child? Tee hee. Maybe I’ll just wait to see if they actually read my blog. 

Now that I think of it, it’s kind of silly that I didn’t go to a grocery store for 17 weeks during the pandemic, but I bought a house. Er…a church. I’m already thinking of it as a home. It has a sort of kindly and gentle and loving air about it, welcoming, compassionate. It’s happy to have the cobwebs swept from its kitchen and its windows polished. I believe buildings retain the atmosphere of what occurred in them, and this place was known for its generosity and joy. I feel privileged to have landed here. 

We drove to Lake Huron and walked along the stone jetties in Bright’s Grove and wandered the wide, shady streets looking at (yes) houses for sale. My son thinks it would be great to overlook water, that shimmering expanse of pearl blue, but he said Bright’s Grove and Sarnia were too big and bustling for him. He preferred the slowness and emptiness of our hamlet. Which is funny coming from a kid who was raised in the fifth largest city in Canada, the kid who wouldn’t go camping because he didn’t like mosquitoes so I had to pitch the tent in the living room. I always thought he’d end up in a bustling place, like Tokyo or New York. He’s the penthouse and glass and steel kind of kid. Or so I thought. But this church seems to have shown me a softer, slower side to him. He’s studying forensics, though, and I don’t know how much demand there would be for that in Sarnia or London, the closest commutable cities. When I pointed that out, he shrugged and said something about maybe just running a food truck at the conservation area campground. 

Covid is winding down a little and things are reopening, but with school about to start up, it’s likely there will be another surge this fall and we will find ourselves in quarantine again. We could use the church as a fever shed. (We have two boarders living with us in our city house, and frankly, I don’t want to be on lockdown with them again. It's difficult for an introvert to be around people 24/7.) Eventually we plan to rent out or sell our city house and move here permanently, when we retire. Or maybe sooner. But first there is much to do, figuring out the ventilation system, replacing the windows, renovating the kitchen. Learning how to do stained glass. 

Sunday morning my husband and son headed home, each having commitments to meet, and I stayed on because I needed to meet the fridge repairman on Monday. I spent Sunday morning writing, and Sunday afternoon reading, napping, reading, walking, napping…whatever my body felt like doing. A terrific thunderstorm lashed the windows with rain, and occasionally I could sense thunder like a truck driving by. I slept on my son’s air mattress in the lower level, because I didn’t feel like trying to cool off the upstairs bedroom, and Brio my dog slept curled beside me. 

Monday dawned flame red and cool, and the temperature in the church remained a comfortable 23-25 all day, with relatively low humidity. For a while I opened the upper front doors and turned on the ceiling fans in the sanctuary to air things out, and then closed them again before it got hot outside. I spent the morning sitting on a camp chair in the breezy shade in front of the church, reading, the dog lying contentedly by my feet. 

The repairman came and went ($145 to salvage a fridge that would cost about $2000 new), and then I took Brio on a walk in the heat of the day. I wanted to explore a particular country road that cuts neatly through flat, beautiful fields of soybeans, lined with trees. A tractor was humming along cutting straw. I could have walked forever. But there was a very determined bee/wasp thing that followed us, darting at our heads, for a quarter mile, and eventually I turned and ran, defeated. I will buy a bug hat with draped netting, and then I can explore in earnest. That should give the locals a good chuckle. Silly city woman, scared of a bug. 

Yes, but it was a very earnest bug. 

There is a country market a block away, and behind it there is a vast stretch of orchard---apples, and fields of what I think are blueberries, raspberries, black and red currants, squash…it goes on for acres. At the very far edge of the fields is a row of tall, dark pines, like a picket fence, delineating the property. I am stunned at the wealth that land represents. I am astounded that I live within walking distance of such beauty. That I have a claim here now. That one day this will be the place where I live full time. I will never tire of walking along those fields. I wish my mother could see this area. She was raised on a farm but ended up married to a professor and living in the suburbs. All my childhood, I remember her driving through the countryside to look at the fields, playing Name that Grain with us kids, explaining the relative merits of different kinds of cows. Just in case any of us needed to know. She would revel in the beautiful fields here, the dark row of trees, the clear and pearly sky stretched so widely above them. As my son said, there is so much more sky to see here, where there are no tall buildings.

To see the full sunrise or sunset, however, I think I will have to go stand in the middle of the road, as there are tall trees surrounding the church that block the view. In the winter, when the deciduous trees lose their leaves, I may have a better view.