Glad to be Alive
Jun. 8th, 2014 07:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bloodsong1Today was the first day I can consciously remember being glad to be alive. I was sitting in the back yard of the lake house, cross stitching away (I've finished a bird and a flower!) while IDK and the boys played Magic inside and Cuteness roamed the banks chasing fishies and throwing rocks. I stopped, looked up at the broccoli hills (I swear the hills in summer look like broccoli crowns) and announced "I am Glad to be Alive". It was a warm fuzzy feeling.
This is the second step in cultivating and courting Hope into my Secret Garden. The first was naming my new car Asa (pr: Asha), which is Hindi for hope. I will continue to take a moment or two once a day to look around and repeat my new mantra.
In other news, the Earthship idea is becoming stronger and stronger. I haven't heard back from the earthship folks out in Taos, NM re: minimum/maximum N-S dimensions. The website (www.earthship.com, ironically enough) has lots of plans for sale but not a lot of hard blueprints or even general dimensions available online. This is understandable, it's how they make half their money. I'm currently working through the archives of the Freeville Earthship, which is outside of Ithaca, (freevilleearthship.blogspot.com). There's proof it can be done! The question is, can it be done on my postage stamp property and where would we live in the meantime? I've pointed out we can move back in with Mama A or even the apartment/second floor of Anny's house and SLB shot me down. It would be difficult, as the current house & garage would have to be razed, whatever scavenged materials would have to be stored as well as hunting down all the tires, bottles and cans needed. The Freeville couple bought an old farm with a usable barn. I do know a plot of land for sale, but it's essentially a gorge. Earthships can be built into hills, but getting up to the road, or downstream to the road, would be an interesting challenge. I suspect our neighbors would complain at the least and may file lawsuits against us at worst. I can't afford to buy land right now. A long term goal to work towards. I WANT this to happen. I'm currently suppressing the need to forage for every can and bottle I can find because we're trying to CLEAR OUT the garage, not add more too it! Although I may set aside the leftover wine bottles from the bottle border. They would need to be cut, cleaned & taped into "bottle bricks", but that would be a fun project to work on now so as to save time and effort later. Hmmm.
This is the second step in cultivating and courting Hope into my Secret Garden. The first was naming my new car Asa (pr: Asha), which is Hindi for hope. I will continue to take a moment or two once a day to look around and repeat my new mantra.
In other news, the Earthship idea is becoming stronger and stronger. I haven't heard back from the earthship folks out in Taos, NM re: minimum/maximum N-S dimensions. The website (www.earthship.com, ironically enough) has lots of plans for sale but not a lot of hard blueprints or even general dimensions available online. This is understandable, it's how they make half their money. I'm currently working through the archives of the Freeville Earthship, which is outside of Ithaca, (freevilleearthship.blogspot.com). There's proof it can be done! The question is, can it be done on my postage stamp property and where would we live in the meantime? I've pointed out we can move back in with Mama A or even the apartment/second floor of Anny's house and SLB shot me down. It would be difficult, as the current house & garage would have to be razed, whatever scavenged materials would have to be stored as well as hunting down all the tires, bottles and cans needed. The Freeville couple bought an old farm with a usable barn. I do know a plot of land for sale, but it's essentially a gorge. Earthships can be built into hills, but getting up to the road, or downstream to the road, would be an interesting challenge. I suspect our neighbors would complain at the least and may file lawsuits against us at worst. I can't afford to buy land right now. A long term goal to work towards. I WANT this to happen. I'm currently suppressing the need to forage for every can and bottle I can find because we're trying to CLEAR OUT the garage, not add more too it! Although I may set aside the leftover wine bottles from the bottle border. They would need to be cut, cleaned & taped into "bottle bricks", but that would be a fun project to work on now so as to save time and effort later. Hmmm.
