Dream Houses

When I was a kid, one of my recur­ring draw­ings was a farm. Rolling hills, a barn, a small house, and hors­es roam­ing the pas­tures were uni­ver­sal fea­tures, along with oth­er ani­mals who inhab­it­ed some incar­na­tions of this dream.  I lived in a neigh­bor­hood of Lexington on less than a quar­ter-acre lot, so this draw­ing was basi­cal­ly man­i­fest­ing a fan­ta­sy, which I played out in var­i­ous ways with mod­el hors­es and dolls. 

Various oth­er dreams and goals came and went.  I want­ed to be a pro­fes­sor, and I got my first col­lege teach­ing job when I was 31.  I want­ed to have chil­dren, and my two daugh­ters were born at near­ly pre­cise­ly the time and inter­val I hoped for.  I want­ed a com­pan­ion, chose one from among my col­lege class­mates, and endured mar­riage to him for 23 years. I admired Berea College (as I tell my stu­dents, the only school I couldn’t get into), and in 2012 when I saw the list­ing for the job I now hold there, it felt like the heav­ens opened and the angels sang while I wrote my cov­er letter. 

All along, the dream of hav­ing land and a farm felt a bit far away, but oth­er dreams came true, and I still hoped the farm would work out.

Not long after I came to Berea, I drove by a small farm for sale, with just the com­bi­na­tion of hills, woods, a stream, and a barn that I had always imag­ined in my child­hood draw­ings. When I hiked there, I found lady’s slip­per orchids bloom­ing in the woods, and newts swim­ming in the farm pond.  With the sale of our Pittsburgh house, I was able to man­i­fest that dream, and moved my two hors­es, while we still lived just a cou­ple of miles away in a reg­u­lar sub­ur­ban house.

A few years lat­er, I admit­ted that one of my wish­es — the lov­ing com­pan­ion — had not worked out the way I had hoped. The August my daugh­ters both left home for school, my divorce was final­ized, and the tiny house a con­trac­tor friend built for me was com­plet­ed.  One dream crashed down, but my ear­li­est dream of all — liv­ing on a farm with my own hors­es graz­ing right out­side my win­dows — sud­den­ly man­i­fest­ed itself.  For the first time, I fig­ured I was liv­ing in my cozy dream home, that myth­ic ide­al that real estate agents speak of the same way that ani­mal res­cuers talk about a dog find­ing its “for­ev­er home.”  As if the dream home is a ter­mi­nal goal.

In the end, what we all have, in those last moments of life, is not a house, but the set of expe­ri­ences, homes, places we’ve vis­it­ed, and peo­ple we’ve loved. 

That year, as you might expect, was a bit rough.  I proud­ly dealt with the mow­ing and fence repair, the gath­er­ing of fire­wood, and the tend­ing of my small herd of equines.  I felt inde­pen­dent and brave, hik­ing solo and find­ing trails scarce­ly marked.  Sometimes, the stream swelled over the ford between the road and my house, and the phrase “Lord will­ing and the creek don’t rise” became part of my social promises. 

I loved my lit­tle house, and I loved my land — walk­ing out my back door, straight up into the woods or to the hid­den water­fall, hav­ing the hors­es walk with me to my car, watch­ing the sun rise and set over my own fields.  I loved retreat­ing home after a long day of work and hav­ing friends over to ride with me through the woods.

It took me a bit to real­ize that while I was liv­ing the dream, it wasn’t nec­es­sar­i­ly my dream to stay there.  Jim and I were dat­ing, and some­times we drove around look­ing at hous­es and neigh­bor­hoods. I’d always been drawn to hous­es along rivers, and one January day, when we drove to a house near Hall’s, I real­ized how fun it would be to try that life, with Jim. And as many of you know, even though we only lived there a year before we were flood­ed out, liv­ing there was a dream, a pan­dem­ic hon­ey­moon with only our kids for com­pa­ny (and the occa­sion­al friends over to kayak, right from our own back door). 

Watching the riv­er rise and fall, the sun break through the morn­ing fog, the snakes and rac­coons and even a beaver (which swam through the back­yard on high-water day). I was enchant­ed and grate­ful.  Within a few months of buy­ing the riv­er house, I sold my dream farm, found homes for the younger equines, and brought to two eldest to a board­ing sta­ble here in Winchester. 

As the riv­er house ren­o­va­tions were fin­ish­ing, Jim and I were once again look­ing at hous­es togeth­er. We were drawn, now, to high ground, and a small­er house, now that our chil­dren are all in col­lege. The young real estate agent we found showed us the house we’re in now, and asked us if it felt like our “dream house.”

In some ways, it is.  We can walk eas­i­ly around town (to College Park, the Traveling Trail, and to Legacy Grove!) The size is just right for us, and I have loved mak­ing gar­dens and talk­ing with neigh­bors and sit­ting on the front porch, feel­ing right at the cen­ter of life here. 

But also, as Lashana wrote in her recent essay on change, the whole dream house idea feels dif­fer­ent now; I’m not the same per­son I was as a kid draw­ing farm fan­tasies with crayons.  I know myself bet­ter, and I’ve learned — often the hard way — that what makes me tru­ly hap­py involves more com­mu­ni­ty and far bet­ter com­pan­ion­ship than I ever dreamed I’d have. I may have anoth­er dream house in two years or ten years. 

In the end, what we all have, in those last moments of life, is not a house, but the set of expe­ri­ences, homes, places we’ve vis­it­ed, and peo­ple we’ve loved.  Some of those loves were for a moment, and some endure still.  Until the end of my life, I hope I keep imag­in­ing and hop­ing and draw­ing and man­i­fest­ing wish­es for myself and my loved ones.  That’s liv­ing the dreams, plur­al and multiplying.