The first time I go to the farm in the Spring, I always experience little stings of anxiety. What if a tree fell on the cabin? What if someone threw bricks through the windows again? What if a side of the pond collapsed under heavy rains?
It’s a small fear, but it’s still there.
That fear was there, as always, a couple of weeks ago. Once we got to the bottom of the hill and I could see the cabin’s roof peaking out between the tree branches, I breathed deeper.
Ah, the fresh smell of early Spring.
There is a golden month at the land where you can walk nearly anywhere. The wild rose and brambles haven’t grown in yet, the undergrowth still wintering. You can see all the way down the holler and back up the other side. You can strike a path anywhere.
My partner and I dropped our bags at the cabin and took off. We wandered around the pond, soaking in the nascent bird songs. We wove through the large pine tree grove, listening to the murmuring of the winds through the soft needles. We trekked to the maple stand and gently whispered, “Some day we’ll harvest sap and turn it to syrup.” We stopped and marveled at the ghostly beech trees that never drop their leaves.
I love the land in the Spring. In truth, I love it in any season. But I hardly went down last year, what with our sweet dog Birch being sick. This year, I plan to make the land a habit again. There are a lot of projects to do and a lot of poetry and songs to write.
The project list for 2025:
Clearing the border before the survey stakes completely disintegrate.
We got a survey done a couple of years ago, and life kept getting in the way of me tackling this massive project. I’ll be using my favorite heavy-duty circular saw on a stick to bushwhack the property edges and driving metal stakes in (spray painted white and pink so they are easy to spot) around the entire 88 acres. It’s a massive project and best started now. Just writing it down is exhausting, but I frankly love a good hard day of manual labor.
Sealing up the cabin more.
I know where the wasps are getting in, nasty lil buggers. The roof line and the door need to be sealed up tighter, both against bugs and weather. And heck, while I’m at it, I might as well install a better door handle that isn’t broken. Bonus project for the cabin if we get to it: paint the ceiling and start finishing the inside with trim to make it even homier.
Extend the dock at the pond.
The dock is great, we love the dock! But if it were 4-6 ft longer and moved up a bit, it would stay out of the water even during high-rain seasons and extend far enough that no one would ever have to walk through squelchy mud to get in and out of the water. This is a Nice To Have, and might turn into a Need To Have once it’s swimming season.
I have plenty of other projects in mind, but those are the top three. Project One, the border, is a huge project and will take me all year. But it’s one I have to do. We did all the work for the survey, and it’d be a shame to lose those markers.
It can be hard for me to visit the farm just to relax. I see projects everywhere I look. So hopefully, this year, this new tactic of a top three list will help me enjoy the land too.
Here’s to stopping and listening to the birds and the wind more.
Now At A Farm 