Life is definitely easier out here now.  Most of the trees are leafing out, flowers are blooming and the woodstove has been idle for almost two weeks.  And tonight I’ll be having fiddleheads sautéed with garlic.

The work season has begun, and I’ll be starting off the season on trail crew again.  After a week or so of clearing trails, I’ll be moving out to the campground I work at.  There’s some positives and negatives to this:  I live at work, I don’t have the freedom that the cabin offers me, but there’s indoor plumbing and the commute is great.

 But I’ve also discovered that as the weather has gotten better, I’ve become more excited to get the cabin ready for next winter.  The outhouse has already been moved, but I have more plans in store.  Build a shed for the generator and get a solar panel and battery for electricity next year.  The solar panel won’t provide a ton of electricity, but it should be enough so that I don’t have to have to walk around in a headlamp for five months of the year.  And honestly, I won’t run the generator unless I have to use some power tools or something like that.

I’m also looking forward to some of the conveniences that I’ll have at the campground.  After months of considering what it is that I miss most, being able to take a hot shower at home whenever I want is the biggest thing.  It’s not that I haven’t been bathing, but the shower at the gym sucked, and my friend’s showers were always open to me, but it still meant driving somewhere.  I can’t wait to come home after a long day of work and take a shower. 

It’s definitely a time of transition, but one thing has become clear to me.  After bouncing around apartments during college, and living inJacksonville, and living in a house where a double homicide was committed, I have some peace.  It’s less than four hundred square feet and a lot of people wouldn’t even stay here for a night, but I call it home.