By now we’ve settled into somewhat of a rhythm on the farm. Ranchito Alegre practices Regenerative Agriculture and the soil is of upmost importance here. Our host Roger has been doing this work for the past several years, but also has a lifetime of experience in other farm work in terms of raising livestock and homesteading. His current offering is broiler chickens (they are delicious – easily the best chicken we’ve ever eaten!), you can order at www.RanchitoAlegre.eatfromfarms.com
We’ll be making a return trip to Denver the week of October 15th and will be doing some family things and other business while there for two weeks. Let me deliver a chicken to you! I so want his business to succeed.
The kids are both officially in online school full time. While not their favorite choice, it’s what we can do in this season of unsettledness, and it’s not forever. The best part is that (ideally) they can be done with computer work in less than half the day and have the remainder of their time ready to help on the farm, to do some cooking or baking, to learn about music or other interesting subjects from Roger, or riding the four wheeler to collect wood for the never ending pile.
While nothing is perfect anywhere and we’ve yet to find utopia, things work relatively well here with our shared responsibilities and we all learn from one another a little more everyday. As we gain more knowledge regarding the business end of a homestead, it’s actually quite discouraging and feels very out of reach for our near future. We simply are not willing to go into significant amounts of debt to bring this dream into reality. It doesn’t mean we won’t keep trying or that the experiment is over and we’re coming back to city life, it just means that a creative solution is in order and we don’t quite know what that looks like just yet…unless of course this IS the creative solution for the time being. Juggling with the uncertainty of it all is my greatest mental challenge for sure. When ever I find my mind wandering into the future I remind myself to stop, look around, and appreciate all that surrounds me. This present moment is all we have every single day.
We have yet to move forward with any bus work – The Home Depot in Durango didn’t have the spray insulation we needed so we are delayed a bit due to the same thing everyone doing any remodeling faces – supply chain shortages. We do have a small diesel heater and piles of blankets, the kids enjoy their solo space in Flossie which also sports three different heaters. It still gets gloriously warm by mid-day and we are loving the changing leaves and crisp, cool mornings. I’m sure there is more I’m forgetting to share but we’re heading back into no cell service zone for a bit while the ranch gets a WiFi provider update.
Hoping to call this place home and to plant some roots!
We’ve returned to big open spaces and the lands of no internet so I’m left with fewer distractions and more time to get my thoughts out into words.
We had planned on leaving shortly after 4th of July weekend, but a sudden death in the family (Zach’s cousin) redirected us to Minneapolis for a weekend with extended family. Rest In Peace Nick, your wise soul left us too soon. You remind us to live life fully right here and right now because none of us knows how long we’ll get.
After about three months longer than anticipated (5 months total!) in the Denver-metro area we finally made it back to the road and our nomadic life. We have huge thanks to give to Zach’s parents for letting us crash at their place with all of our crazy vehicles, big kid personalities and all of our stuff. The city of Thornton felt differently than our parents and we got an eviction notice from them the day before we had planned on leaving.
My dad has settled into life and good routines at his memory care facility and we got all of his affairs in order before our departure. Leaving it all in the hands of Applewood and my siblings was harder than I thought it would be. I know he has everything that he needs, I’ll just miss our regular visits. His dementia means that I don’t know what kind of condition he’ll be in next time we see him (which will probably be monthly now rather than weekly).
Fully packed, we rolled out on Friday, July 23. Bus, trailer, all of our possessions, into the great unknown. Our first stop was San Luis. My friend from high school (and great realtor who just sold my parent’s house) offered up a parking spot on her beautiful land just north of the New Mexico border. We have a few places we want to scope out just into N.M. before deciding where we could see ourselves homestead for this next chapter.
Upon getting Flossie set up and organized, we immediately fell into our slower pace and greater appreciation for the beauty that surrounds us. Even if that beauty was pulling in while white knuckling during a huge rainstorm. I’ve driven the trailer a handful of times, usually for shorter distances over the last nine months. This trek into Aimee’s land put us all to the test. The dirt roads were soupy and slow going. But we arrived in one piece. Our timing was perfect, the weekend was full of festivities celebrating the 170th year of the small town San Luis, Colorado’s oldest town. We took in the sights and enjoyed the music, car show, and vendors that were strewn out all over town.
The following two weeks we logged plenty of dirt road miles and have seen lots of different properties, we also figured out where it’s best to get supplies, where to get daily WiFi for Camden’s online summer camp, how to handle mishaps (like a flat tire) when we’re so remote, where to do laundry, get drinking and cleaning water, and where the cheapest gas is since it’s by far one of our biggest current expenses. Originally we were going to use this area as a base point for going into northern New Mexico, but after looking and comparing land prices it seems we can get more bang for our buck in this part of Colorado. Plus we’d love to stay Co. residents for ease of things with the courts and guardianship over my dad.
So we are here for the long haul looking for our little landing place that we can call our own and share with friends and family. PVC land markers are becoming our new normal sighting, rarely does an online listing match it’s actual location or coordinates in the field, and hardly anybody gets in touch with you after reaching out, so that’s fun. The good news is we know what we don’t want (middle of nowhere, zero land features or trees) so by process of elimination we are honing in on what we DO want (to be in an established community, some trees even if they’re not huge, a view, mixed land features flat and hilly). We also did our due parental process and found out about the local K-12 public school registration here for the kids. When they saw the 8-4 schedule and learned that they’d be riding a school bus two hours each day the decision to homeschool another year was easily confirmed.
Something that keeps popping into my mind as we do these daily things (and amongst the things we walked away from this past year) is that we have definitely chosen a harder way. Some of it out of necessity -we want to build a bus as a tiny home because we have been priced out of a bonkers real estate situation in any city. Some of it out of a deep desire for a simpler and slower pace. Sure, there are parts that are carefree like the hikes, sunsets, rainbows, and wildlife viewing. But some are really hard, like reading county codes about land use, and building rules and regulations, crossing your eyes over how many plots look the same and are the markers even in the right place.
Some days I long for easy, but I know our old lives are no longer for us. I miss community and having people alongside us to share the load. I miss sharing meals with our parents. And I’m almost always contemplating that these communal things happened differently not long ago and came together for our ancestors, we were never meant to go it alone, it’s just been ingrained in us for the last 100 years or so. I hope wherever we end up that we can cultivate some semblance of the community we crave.
I leave you with this from a timely email from preacher that I follow:
O God, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown.
Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go, but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us, through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Good Courage Prayer – extended dance mix
by Nadia Bolz-Weber
O God, you have called your servants-
And you have such questionable taste in servants.
Your servant selection process needs some work
Because O God you have again called your
Foreign women and weary retirees
You have called your pole dancers and police sergeants.
O God you have again called thirsty women and broken men and we who foolishly think we volunteered, as if we raised our eager hand and you called on us when really we were conscripted.
Oh God you have called your servants
to ventures of which we cannot see the ending,
I don’t know how this story ends, Lord.
Could we maybe just skip to the end so I could read the last few verses?
I won’t tell anyone, I promise.
Because, If I can’t see the ending then how do I know if I am getting close?
So God if you could please just give this servant that blue pin at the end of my Google Map directions so that even if the route keeps changing I at least know where I am eventually getting to. Then I’d know which route takes 4 minutes longer, one graduate degree longer, a few emotional breakdowns longer than the one I’m on. Should I face what I already know or what I will surely learn?
Oh God you have called your servants
to ventures of which we cannot see the ending,
by paths as yet untrodden
We’ve not been where we are going yet.
Make a way on these paths we’ve not yet taken – through parks where junkies fix and children play, through starter mansions and public housing and suburban strip malls and dry land wheat farms and cheap motel that charge by the hour if you know how to ask for it.
Oh God you have called your servants
to ventures of which we cannot see the ending,
by paths as yet untrodden,
through perils unknown.
Wait. Perils? Well, ok so maybe I take back the thing about knowing the end because I don’t think Gandolf meant for us to go this way Mr. Frodo. I want to know the end and also know the way to the end but not to know the perils that get me to the end because if I knew the perils I would never start the journey because I’m certain I am just not peril-ready. I am never peril-ready.
So, Lord of the questionable servants we’re gonna need some help.
So….
Give us faith
Hand it over. Seriously. Cough it up. We don’t generate enough of our own so if you call us, equip us, Lord. Give us faith to go out with good courage,
Or at least good enough courage.
Give us faith to go out with good courage, knowing only that your hand is leading us
Your strong hand. Your soft hand. The one that molded us out of dirt.
If your hand can lead Jesus out of his own grave, then it is indeed strong enough to lead us out of ours too.
Give us faith to go out with good courage, knowing only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us eternally; through Jesus Christ
…who breaks open prisons, frees slaves and captives, feasts with the outcast and celebrates strangers.
Jesus who was so bad at choosing his friends and just as bad at choosing his servants.
Jesus who even now stands among his faltering friends and shows us his hand and his side and gives us his peace. Gives us his faith, gives us his good courage, gives us his leading hand, gives us his love gives us his support.
And it is enough for the ventures of which we cannot see the end. Amen.
The Writings of Breanne Mashek 