I sit looking out at the swaying pines, the rippling lake waters, and the cloud laced sky and realize that as harsh as the land is, our little getaway in the northern wilds of Maine is something close to paradise. The beauty is not friendly, or is friendly in that challenging way of "if you can handle me, you can find enjoyment in my company." I know winters here are intense and long, and the beauty of the place is not the soft and comfortable kind we find in the mid-Atlantic piedmont, but the stark and edgy beauty here has a kind of zest for life and drive for being which is appealing.
I have not read as much as I'd planned. I have not written as much as I'd planned. I have not created as much physical art as I'd planned. I have not lost the weight I had planned. I have not recovered as much as I planned, though that is due more to having slipped on the stairs and re-injuring an already recuperating shoulder joint -- possibly enough to warrant therapy, hopefully not surgery. Yet, for all of that, I am mostly content with where I am (save the injured shoulder, which vexes me because it was avoidable and of my own making). Very little, in fact, has gone to plan... but in many ways, it is what I needed and as such is perfect.
If it were practicable... if I could find a rewarding vocation up here, turn our 2 season home (1/2 spring, summer, 1/2 fall) into a 4 season home, and enlarge it to make it comfortable for us to live in year around, I would move here without pause or trepidation. I do not fear the isolation, which is not so isolated as it was 50 years ago, nor do I fear the challenges of climate or the need to restructure our lives to flow the seasons instead of fairly ignoring them in our present residence. It would not be easy, but I find my mind turning to the possibility distractingly often, and I have done 4 floorplans for a revision or rebuild of the cabin to become a year around home. All dreams, idle for the most part, but compelling none the less.
Next week we return to Pawsville, and responsibilities, and duties, and a world of demands and needs and expectations. I do not dread it as my wife does, but I look toward the inevitability with a pang of regret. It would be such an amazing life here... for five decades or so, not simply the 5+ weeks a year we manage now.
I won't be putting my life on hold for the improbability of making it real... I'm done with existing in a life "paused". Time to get things done and live... even if that life is one of a man older, fatter, and not much wiser. I can still make it a remarkable life... if I pay attention.
