It seemed as if the weather had sensed that i was at the end of my rope and in a matter of hours the temperature rose from 30 to 60, with a high of 72 scheduled for the afternoon. I was determined to get us out in the yard to enjoy it as it was to return to the thirties in the evening.
Every once in a while a goose or a pair of geese would fly overhead. They were incredibly difficult to capture on camera but the noise of their honking was a beautiful reminder that i was not in the city anymore and sometimes they flew low enough for me to hear the flapping of their wings and see their bellies as they flew over. All spring i had seen a pair flying together but come winter i only saw 1 at a time. One lone goose honking overhead.
In an act of desperation i repurposed the “dog run/chicken run/purpose to be assigned at later date in time fenced thing” once again as a play pen to keep my grounded girls busy while i hung the laundry in the yard. I wanted them to have a chance to enjoy the weather without destroying anything else so i prayed they would forget how to dig under the fencing and just run in there instead.
For some reason, they obliged me. They did not dig under the fence this time and instead wrestled, played, ran, and chewed dug-up young tree stumps i had thrown in there for them to gnaw on. Finally, i had a moment of peace and they had some outdoor time. A dump truck broke down alongside the road next to our property and the dogs figured out they could bark at it from behind two fences just as well as they could one. I was getting lots of chores done and they seemed to be enjoying themselves.
When i finished hanging all the laundry in the yard i returned to the house to open all the windows. Any time the weather was in the 60s or 70s i turned off the wall unit, tied up the curtains, and opened all the windows to air out the place and let the freshness in.
Though always a little cluttered just by the sheer lack of storage space in my little tiny house, the interior was a beautiful sight to behold on sunny days when i could open the windows in mid to late morning. There were only windows on one side of the house so I only got the light during the first half of the day. There was nothing i enjoyed more than those days when the windows could be opened up. The window in the bathroom created a cross breeze and a gentle wind touched everything as i sat in the rocking chair or cooked in the kitchen. It was peaceful and it evacuated the wet dog and old laundry smell that tended to build up in the winter when the fresh air hadn’t been allowed in for a while.
Wherever i had lived, even in apartments, i had always taken a rock from outside and placed it on the window sill. It reminded me to stay connected to the earth. It felt as if i was inviting a little bit of it in, so as to keep my living space a part of nature, not a structure meant to shut it out.
Love your rock idea. I made a lime pebble when we pointed our barn and it sits on a little stone outcrop from the wall. Reminds me too of where we all come from and eventually go.