THE STORY OF OUR NEW HOME, SINGING MEADOW (Introduction)
My heart leaps. At twilight, we turn off the crowded highway, headed north. And now it begins--the tug of home. The never-ending surprise of the north-country beauty, the pleasure of heading home. Most cars are moving southward, returning to the city. But my home is a land abundant with lakes, forests, fields and hills. Now we are circling and climbing, ever-climbing into cottage country. Where most can spend only weekends and fragments of summer, this is my native land. There has never been a time when this has failed to make me rejoice.
My own particular home is a little farther away now, but just as welcoming to me as Foley Mountain, where my family and I spent so many memorable years. How this change came about is my story and gift to you now. In a world surfeited with sorrow and loss, a world wildly out of harmony, I reach in gratitude for fragments of nature, cherishing these before it is too late.
Some years before, my husband, Barry, and I were seated in the office of a Toronto funeral director, signing the final documents following my mother-in-law’s burial. “Westport?” he asked. “Where’s that?” Numbed by the preceding painful days, we politely sketched in a few details. Our home, we told him, was in the middle of eight hundred reasonably wild acres of a conservation area overlooking a little village of seven hundred people and seven churches, on the shores of the Little Rideau Lake. Barry was supervisor there, and living on-site was part of his job. What he most loved about working there was teaching outdoor conservation education to children and public of all ages. Our children had gone to the little school overlooking the lake. This village was a place where children could still roam free, sure in the knowledge that many villagers were watching out for them. Moreover, if someone was sick, this was the kind of place where neighbours still cared, bringing food, helping out. Sensing our listener’s surprise and interest, we went on a bit. Deer, and many other creatures, walked right by our house. We had a huge vegetable garden which supplied our needs throughout most of the year. “They do? You have?” blurted the director. Then he surprised us by exclaiming “I didn’t think there was anywhere like that left now.” Thinking of the miles of city we had passed en route to our meeting with him, I guess we shouldn’t have been surprised. In North America, a country home is becoming a rarity now. For me, it’s a privilege I never take for granted.
For thirty years, I lived, moving as freely and joyously as the resident deer herd, scrambling over ridges, hearing the ocean-like wind in the pines, sitting watching the ice form on remote ponds. But in time, change made living within a park less desirable. Sometimes, when there was talk of harvesting trees to turn a profit for the hard-pressed conservation authority, I wished I owned this loved land and could prevent ravages. After a neo-conservative provincial government was elected, fund-raising consumed increasingly large amounts of the time Barry used to spend caring for the park, and sharing its specialness with visitors. Inevitably, over these years, the town below “the mountain” had become much busier. Now there was rarely a time of quiet. Even on Christmas Bird count morning, when I walked out before dawn to listen for owls, I heard the grinding gears of heavy trucks ascending the big hill west of the park.
With the help of a warm-hearted community, we had achieved what we wanted—assurance that this beautiful park would continue to be cherished and that the environmental education program Barry had developed would continue. Ironically, though, this very success made Foley Mountain less of a home for me. Solitude is essential for a writer. Much as I love people, it was actually painful to abandon my train of thought to talk with the many people who now walked the trails and who stopped by, or phoned our home/office at all times of the day and night. Living in the old rented farm house within the park was a requirement and, for the most part, a privilege of the job. As Barry’s retirement approached, we knew we would need a place of our own to live. For the first time in our lives we would be in a position to own a home. Although Barry was too busy to help much, I was starting to shape plans for a much-longed for country home of my own. In my mind, I called it Heart’s Desire.
