Returning Home...

This lady has been pretty excited lately, and now quite nostalgic sitting here reminiscing. My stepmother just officially moved off of our family farm as of last Friday. The travel into town and the regular yard work was beginning to be too much for her, so she decided to buy a little house in town. This means that...until my husband and I are able to move up permanently...this will become a 'vacation' home of sorts for my sister, myself and our families.

It's been 10yrs, on May 31, since Dad's been gone and we've been patiently waiting for our stepmother to make the decision to move off to reclaim our birthright...as he always called it.

My grandparents building their first home
on this land they broke themselves by hand.

We've always known it was coming and we looked so forward to it all of these years, but I have to admit that I am now truly understanding the meaning of the word bittersweet. As I fantasize about renovating our childhood farmhouse for us to eventually move into, faint memories drift back into my conscious mind. Will I be able to sit at the kitchen table, like I did so many times before, and gaze longingly out the window...waiting for the image of my father to stroll into the yard from the hay field?

The farm, as we knew it. This photo was taken from the spot
where Grandma & Grandpa's original log home was built.

Will I be able to walk around the corner of the house and not tear up to the memory of the beautiful yellow and pink rose bushes, long since removed, that my mother so lovingly tended to until her death in 1979? That will definitely take some getting used to....seeing the ghosts from our past everywhere we look.

Our little family, beside one of
Mom's rose bushes. 1977 

Dad wished to be scattered over the 'home half' section of land, but our stepmother preferred that he be interred in the small country cemetery about 3 miles up the road. Because he often said in life "What happens at funerals and cemeteries should be up to those left behind, not the dead....they shouldn't really care what happens to them after they're dead!", we compromised. My sister and I, with our kids in tow, scattered half of his ashes in the 4 corners of the 'home half'', at the foot of the Saskatoon bushes he'd planted with our stepmother alongside the fence line between the 2 quarter sections, and among his herd of purebred Red Angus cattle. *smiles* During his final two weeks on this plane, his dying wish was that we pick him up out of his hospital bed and drive him in the gator among his herd...one last time. Since it was a wish made while he was very high on morphine, the hospital thought it best that he stay where he was at. So, my sister and I felt it was quite fitting to spread some of his ashes among the herd after he'd finally passed. As we stood back and admired the scene, we couldn't help but laugh when we realized the cattle were grazing the grass we'd scattered him on! LOL So, at least we can say he has lived on through his herd! ;D

Some of Dad's herd, taken the year he passed away. April 2003

Yes, bittersweet is a good word to describe these feelings, but at least I know that whenever I want to talk to Dad...or my Mom or grandparents for that matter...I just have to walk over to the treeline and pick Saskatoons with him. Maybe I'll also try my hand at growing some roses myself this summer. :D