We came here in 1991, to what had been my Grandparents' home when I was child. It was like shifting dimensions when I came around the street corner from the chaos of the commercial world and turned onto the little old side street lined with trees, views to bog & river, mowed fields and distant neighbors. A peaceful, calm & quiet place with so many old trees that it was hard to choose who to listen to next. Each spoke to me in their own way, each had different information, history, vision or stories.

A pair of Cedars opposite the kitchen door frame a glimpse of the cranberry bogs beyond, where once had stretched acres of fresh meadow around the winding Weweantit River. A pair of Spruce to the South (imported from the Maine Coast, the story goes) watched over the front rooms of the house, shading the 1st floor rooms from the hot summer sun.  Volunteer Locusts & Sassafrass reached for the sky and waved in the afternoon wind, whistling sweet nothings, from anywhere you might look. Ancient, tall pines overlooked scrubby oaks, swamp maples and dishevelled wild cherries. Towering over all of them, a Linden Tree (another Maine import, I've heard) shaded the north end of the house and a good part of the upper field in the summer with heart-shaped, soft, limey-green leaves. Beginning just before the 4th of July, this tree presents us with bushels of little delicate yellow Linden flowers each year. Perfect for a calming tincture or flower essence, she invites 100's of honey bees and other pollinating, flying critters to sup. No surprise I close my office door at the end of June and we picnic in the lower field until they have had their way with her and move on to the next flowering thing.