Surprises

Beltane                                                              New (Summer) Moon

Marketing my manuscripts has always come hard.  I read today about a poet, Patricia 500P1030645Lockwood, whose husband sent out her work in what he called a blitz. The New Yorker published submission number 240 after Poetry had published submission number 179. I’m still in the low 20’s in my submissions. Of course, novels are not poems and blitzing poems is easier than novels, but the energy level required is, I imagine, the same.

Marketing our house, however, seems like it will be easier. I hope. When I think of our house from an outsider’s perspective, I think of it as full of pleasant surprises. They start when the cristata and the star crocus bloom and proceed through the daffodils, the tulips, the iris, the lilies, the clematis, the monkshood, the bug bane and liguria. Early, too, is the magnolia, a white pillar of fire for a week or two. In their own time the fruit trees blossom, the lilacs and the peonies. Later on the 500P1030693daylilies will come in. If vegetables are planted, they provide interest over the growing season, too.

Then we have the firepit area and the magical shed for grandchildren, two tool sheds and a contained 1.5 acres with woods, a wonderland for dogs and kids. Downstairs we have a steambath, upstairs a grill in the counter. We have a professional Viking stove and a fully insulated garage with gas already plumbed in for a heater.

Within the last five years we’ve replaced the air conditioner, furnace and well pressure tank. Within the last eight we renovated the living room and kitchen, installing new flooring, counters and removing a wall between the kitchen and the living area. We’ve also 500P1030676installed new lighting fixtures. In the same time frame we put on a new roof and new siding.

(photograph in our woods this week)

But here’s the clincher surprise, if it were me. Yep, we have a morel patch in our woods. We just had a steak and morel meal on Sunday. Finding them was a highlight of the first year we lived here.

Oh, did I mention that our land was a hemp farm during WWII? Look up hemp if you don’t understand why that’s interesting. We’re no Colorado on this point. Yet.