ARRIVED IN EAST TEXAS A YEAR AGO TODAY - THE PINEY WOODS

 

IT'S BEEN A YEAR TODAY...

.. since we packed it all up, moved and arrived in Pittsburg, Texas. East Texas. The Piney Woods. Homeless! Bet it all the day we left.

We moved out of the NH house the day we closed and into a motel. Needed the governor's permission to do stay over night in a motel. C19 was just getting its foot hold on the nation.

We needed the permission from the governor of Pennsylvania also for our BnB overnight plan.

Two cars packed to the water line. Walkie talkies and we burnt up a set of batteries each day, bumper to bumper weaving in and out, with the long haul truckers, talking to each other about the roads ahead and pit stops.

We arrived in Pittsburg, TX 3 days later to our rented BnB in which we would live for two months. Our time was spent house shopping. Every day. Much of our downtime there was sitting and looking out over vast green fields, realizing that God has spent extra time here too in the design.

In those early days, we found great eateries. I have told her several times that if I had known how good the food was in Texas, we would have moved years ago. The up-quality/difference/availability is that noticeable.

All of the folk we encountered, less a couple real estate agents, have been wonderfully polite, helpful and wishing us happiness here in Texas. I specifically remember one gal welcoming us to the country of Texas. Serious as a heart attack.

We finally landed in a wonderful 3.5 acre patch of land in the Piney Woods and a new home near Scroggins, Tx. It was inside the circle area we chose to find a new home and has everything we will ever need. Other towns within a half hour and Dallas, two hours away, offer all the icing on the cake we could ever imagine. Add to this year around local markets. Meat, raw milk, veggies, fruits, baked goods.

We knew we had a found the right home and place to live when we could not find the home location, on a daily basis, without a GPS for the first several weeks. We are continually amazed at an endless new back farm roads. We often go out to lunch with our close neighbors and not once have traveled local roads to and from that her and I are familiar with.

Today we are nestled in, all major construction work done that we added after buying the house. Our first garden is up and running. A test garden for me. We have so far harvested all of the main herbs, onions, baby red potatoes, lettuce, spinach and a crap load of radishes. You want to try your hand at gardening, start with radishes.

We do not miss the weather up north. We DO miss good friends and family.

In the past year we have not watched more than a total of 5 minutes of media news. Have quit all of that cold turkey.

We re-said our vows of marriage over Christmas. It has been 20 years and we have joked since we married that we would renegotiate an extension in 20 years. We did and are in it now until some unforeseen event.

Her has had a foot-fix operation and we have replaced all of our doctors and healthcare folk. I was worried about this, but healthcare here is as good if not better. From dentist to PCP, we are in good hands. We have also found an excellent concierge doctor. Major hospital needs within driving range.

We had our medicare wellness check up last week and one of the questions (they ask a lot of questions now) they ask, apparently to check out senility, was "what day was it." Funny, I looked at my wife and asked, “what is today?”

I had to think through what we were doing and because we had this doctor appointment on Friday, I answered, “Friday.” But most days we do not know w/o having to think. My wife confirmed, “yep, Friday.” All of this husband and wife banter playing out while our new PCP watched.

We know Sundays though, because we cannot drive to town for gas station fried chicken or DQ dipped cones. No fried chicken on Sundays or dessert.

Roots setting now. At my/our age all of this still surprises me. We made the decision. Acted on it and have never looked back. 

It all started here a year ago today.

Thanks for the visit.