Space for Wildflowers

Wildflowers in Spring

Yesterday I confessed to owning an above ground pool. Maybe less than a confession more like an acknowledgement. Today, I’d like to acknowledge we once lived in a double-wide trailer, with two kids. It happened when we sold our home in Pasadena, after the oldest graduated high school, to move to the country. I thought we should rent before buying in case we didn’t like it. The only thing available, however, was that double-wide on three acres in Manvel. I never thought we’d do it, but we did. In we went.

Best move we ever made. Coming home from a long, hard day of selling books (actually, it never really was hard, but the days were long) it was refreshing to step out the door into the open spaces. Plus, I’d just acquired a black lab, and it gave him lots of room to run as I threw his dummy. It was good for both of us. And the double-wide was nice. It kept us dry in wet weather, warm in cold, and cool in hot. That feels like pluses to me. I don’t recall what anyone thought about it, I never asked.

Eventually, we moved on down to road, literally, to Alvin. Bought six acres, a little to close to Chocolate Bayou as it would turn out. Got the last two kids out of school, and empty nested. That was fun. Started our little company, there, too. That was hard, then fun. Now, here we are in the Hill Country on land once owned by my family, next to the house where my great-grandmother lived, in a home that has less square footage than the double-wide. On the plus side, however, it doesn’t take long to get to the bathroom and there’s space out back for wildflowers and a pool.

John W. Wilson is the author of The Long Goodbye: A Caregiver’s Tale