Lenore, Frieda, Rose and Izzy are in the kennel, returning Friday

June 4, 2009 – Dry, warming. I was in NYCity yesterday and today. I love New York City, and the culture there is as compelling as it is overwhelming. My daughter lives there, and it is an amazing and wonderful place. I think the best of everything is in New York City.
  Driving up the FDR Drive, weaving through traffic, crawling over the GW Bridge into New Jersey, I saw clearly where I belonged. That is a powerful sensation.
  It isn’t that I don’t love the city, or respect and appreciate it. It is just not for me. When I drove up the hill to the farm, Mother was waiting by the back door and the donkeys and sheep all stirred a bit, acknowledging me in their quiet way.
  I suspect we all have a slice of earth where we know we belong, where we feel at home in a particular and profound way. The farm is my place. It is where I love, work and the stimulus for much of what creativity I have. In my life, I have rarely, if ever, felt as if I belonged places. I have not been fortunate to find communities for me, and that says more about me than the communities, I realize. I have been blessed to find a slice of the earth where I belong. Here, I am coming to terms with my life, for better or worse, something that becomes clear when you are away.
   I know and love every inch of it, and the animals are just a piece of it. I suppose we are our own community here. At last.