July 1, 2008 – I don’t know how often I tell myself that life is strange, and it is. Tonight, on this old farm, built on the side of a hill in 1861,  in a small hamlet in upstate, I am sitting in an upstairs room across from an old wood stove mount, working on my blog, preparing to work on my book.
  It is pitch dark outside, and I hear the coyotes and see the bugs throwing themselves against the screen, and the animals out in the pasture are quiet, and the dogs are tucked in various crevices and corners of the house, asleep.
  Downstairs, in a room right below me,  the room where the builder of my farm, James Patterson, was laid out, is my daughter Emma, up from Brooklyn, working on her baseball blog and then, in the morning, going to work on her book.
 Em got in from New York City this evening, mumbling about traffic, and we watched the tail end of the Yankee game, and ate some food, and she unpacked and set up her laptop, and we walked the dogs in the woods, and sat on the porch, the dogs gathered around us, including Perfect Pearl, who lives with Emma, and we listened to the frogs and crickets, and I watched the farm do a bit of its magic on her.
  Sitting on the porch, I couldn’t help but think of those years carpooling, driving her to lessons, taking her to baseball games, circuses, trips to the city, playdates, Disney World, and there were no blogs, and nothing was more important in the world that whether she got the best teacher next year. How far that life seems, how different. How do you reconcile it with donkeys, steers, dogs, sheep, injured roosters, lightning storms, coyotes and guns? You don’t.  You can’t.
  Sometimes, I think I’m just a cameo in my own life.
  When I think of coming up to the farm, and seeking to live my life, I also think of the many sacrifices involved in that, some of which I’m only beginning to grasp, and one of them is that I moved hours away from my daughter and her life.
  Suddenly, our lives were so different, and far apart. It was difficult to stay connected.
  A month or so ago, I went to Brooklyn to enter her life, and we had a great time, and now she is here, and we will hang out, sit on the porch, drive around the country,  go to movies, and take walks,  work on our books, and take photos together. I gave her the camera I started taking photographs with a year or so ago, and we’ll take our Canons, head out in the new Toyota and do some damage.
  Most days, I want to kiss the ground, and give thanks that I took that chance, and bought that farm, and I think of all the things I got, and all the things I lost. That is makes the perfect life. It is never perfect.
 

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  I got a ton of e-mail about websites and forums that taught me a great deal about this site, and how people feel about that, and I was going to write about that tonight, but Em got in late, and I am tired, and the sheep have to go out and graze in the morning, so I’ll write about that tomorrow. Thanks for the great and very interesting responses.