# 161 - Going to Our Land!

After a rough year of having to avoid our acreage, we're finally going for a few days and I can't wait to see how things look after being gone for so long.

This past year, We've had an exceptional Texas drought that created wild fires, some of them mighty close to our property. In fact, we've not yet checked out our land since those fires took place and I hope our big trees are still standing tall and healthy.

Then, we had such a long time with gas prices that were nearly high enough to start a revolt. There would not be much extra driving around in our trucks with those gas expenses. We scaled back to embrace "Necessary Driving." If the trip wasn't completely necessary, then you better not be driving.

Other than the forest fires, there were other issues that kept us away from the land...this and that. And now, we're headed out this week for a big camping trip, supposedly the weather is going to be nice. Let's hope that Mother Nature and the Weather Man on TV are working nicely together.

In preparation for our trip, Deputy Dave took his chainsaw to the local garden equipment repairman and they overhauled the carburetor for a good price and he then took the heavy-duty garden tractor's battery to be exchanged, so we've got two good pieces of lawn equipment to keep both of us busy over the next few days.

I'm so excited about going to our acreage that I can barely keep my heart from racing! I'll be sure to take a ton of pictures. We are going to again take a good look at everything and maybe re-mark some fading boundary lines. Trying to figure out where we're going to build our country home is a puzzle that we must figure out very soon.

And I had discussions with my grandmother on Christmas Day about us moving to our acreage. She's been to our acreage, her and my mother enjoyed a picnic on our land a few years ago on a bright, sunny day. My grandmother wanted to move out there herself, right then. She loves it there.

My grandmother is in her mid 80's and has lotsa Native American blood running through her veins. We've been told it's Cherokee. And Cherokee are known for having this ability of fore-sight...to know of certain things before they happen, a kind of sixth sense about what is to come. All my life, I've been told and shown this ability. Well, it's just presented as, "...and here's what happened after I warned her not to go..." It's sometimes as if you can sense something about to go wrong --- even if it's 200 miles away.

And the weird thing is, my family does have this ability in very strong ways. Let's just put it this way, when I start to get a vague "bad" feeling, I start saying my prayers.

For this time away, I've been a little apprehensive. My grandmother has not been doing well, but she's been ill for quite a long time. The strange thing is...she seemed to have a little "rally" the other day and the high level of the rally worries me. In my experience with loss of life, I've seen a rally usually end with death. So, I'm concerned. I've put the family on notice of where I will be and I'm hoping that my grandmother is truly having an authentic ongoing rally, not a sudden rally before death.

I cannot be too sad when she goes because she's ready to meet her Maker. She knows her Lord and is eager to be in his presence. She's tired and fully ready to move to her Heavenly address. 

So, as we must do in life, I keep going forward instead of being frozen by the "what-if's" of life. And that means we get to take a trip to our acreage, and I'm beyond thrilled. It's been too long since we've been there, at least since early summertime.

My preparations to leave for our land is to clean, clean, clean and pack our personal belongings. As for the cleaning, I'm not talking surface cleaning...I clean the corners of each room, wax the floors, condition the leather sofas, dust forgotten dusty things and use a damp cloth to make the baseboards shine. Yes, even the toilets get their special attention.

Cleaning now is a gift to myself for later...for our return home. I love coming back to everything being nice and welcoming. Usually, we're exhausted upon our return, so it's great to come home to a clean house so I can focus on all of our dirty camping laundry and we can relax. Often, we're exhausted from the trip, so we don't really want to do anything but what is necessary.

On our trip, I'll be taking a ton of photos. There's no telling what I'll come across. We'll have Howdy and Lyla, the big dogs with us for the trip. They'll love being on the land and able to run without boundaries. The Yorkie is staying behind with her own mommy and some of her friends. We already learned that Belle the Yorkie does not do road trips.

We've had so much rain lately that I hope the ground won't be too mushy. However, all the plant-life is surely thankful for the long drink that was much needed. By Spring, everything will be lush and full of greenery. I know it will be beautiful.

So, I'll be sitting on the lawn tractor for the next few days...this means I'll be able to mentally zone out and be free from the cares of the world. There's something about being on a tractor that neutralizes all worries; you simply pay attention to what is in front of you, look at nature surrounding you and note the incremental progress you're making with each pass of the blades. I feel that it is a job sent straight from Heaven. Put me on a tractor any day.

Hopefully, very soon we'll be able to hand the keys to this house over to the new owners. I believe that next week we will probably get the glass door repaired. I'll be back at my painting tasks and will be doing some serious pre-packing of non-essential nostalgia items that we don't need to have sitting out, but that we will want to have for another day. Every box I pack now will help us later.

But, for today, I will be excited about stepping foot on our land again. I feel blessed. Yes, there's always a sense of anxiety when going to the land after such a long time away, but a piece of Heaven seeps right into my bones again once we're there.

And my bones are parched!