Every time I get away from the city, I take a risk. I risk overwhelming sensations of longing for a life close to the land. It’s cliché, but it’s real. I want so badly to feel connected to the earth, the sky, the hard-scrabble life among scrub oak springing impossibly from weathered rock.
That’s it. There’s nothing romantic, nor real, about it. It’s simply an aching sense that I’ve never been where I should be. Later, when I realize it’s an impossible dream, it’s an opportunity to feel lost and angry.
I understand that longing. It’s why I bought my first piece of land when I was 20 years old. Ten acres in southern Oregon. Of course, I was much too young and naive to “live off the land”– so sold it a year later. But the longing never left, and when given another chance, took it.