There is no beginning, and there is no end. The sun rises, and falls, each day, and the seasons come and go. The days, months, and years alternate through sunshine, rain, hail, wind, snow, and frost.
– James Rebanks, The Shepherd’s Life
What I dream about is calling the place where the water runs by moonlight home. Home home. Not just the home of my heart, but the home where I rest my head at night. Where I return to after long journeys home. Where both the morning and the evening sun touch my face home.
I dream of dots of golden light shining from the hills – beacons saying, “here is a place of warmth and life.” I dream of falling asleep to the west wind blowing softly through the wind, to the yips of coyotes and the hooting of the owls who have always lived in the barn and always will. I dream of a house on the hill, and me living in it. And perhaps not just me. A family, all my own. Living in the house on the hill. Living with the great privilege of watching the seasons pass, one after the other, on and on.
I dream of the snugness of a winter’s night. I dream of the freshness of a spring morning. I dream of the stillness of a summer’s night. I dream of the crispness of a fall morning. I dream of knowing the deer that bound over the hills, of the hawks that wheel above, of the countless critters that scurry. I dream of the first crocus of the year just outside the door, and the heady scent of the wolf willow, and the bright, peeping faces of Black-Eyed Susans. I dream of a house on the hill. In the hills. My hills. Home.
from the gap 