Part 2, version 1: returning to Maine, number 77
Below is the story of the first place we put an offer on after 4 years of looking for home. We wrote this immediately after we lost our chance to steward that land, which is an essential part of the story of how we came to be where we are.
In case you didn’t read it, or in case its helpful to the storytelling, here is a short summary of Part 1:
Our family had been seeking a home place in the world for more than 4 years. We sold our Maine farm in March of 2020, before the pandemic’s affects on the market for real estate were fully realized. We sold 30 acres of decent soils with a large house, small barn, and 2 bay garage in Belfast, Maine for $250,000. We had purchased it for $205,000. One year after we sold it, that land was likely worth at least $350,000. We moved to Huntington, Vermont so I could take a job running a federal grant program that invests $11M annually into sustainable agriculture and research in the Northeast.
Although the money from the sale of our farm was the most money we had ever had, it was soon irrelevant in the high priced, low inventory real estate market with high interest rates. While we could easily get approved for a $300,000+ mortgage, we knew we couldn’t afford to pay it.
4 years passed in Vermont, slowly depleting our savings just to live. Most of that time was spent analyzing the market and finding nothing suitable or affordable, spending hours on the phone with banks trying to understand how to finance land, or camps, or non-traditional mortgages. All the financing was expensive, confusing, and inaccessible to us. Eventually, due to a loving relationship, our dear friend Ava agreed to offer us a $250,000, 0% interest loan. In time, the depth of her generosity led her to offer it instead to us as a gift.
2024 – #77, in Maine
As we began earnestly looking with a new energy, we quickly realized that our longings for the qualities of the place we would call home were likely shared by many. We would have loved a livable structure (a house or camp or cabin) on the land, but quickly realized that any such structures in our price range would either need massive amounts of work or would come on land that was not suited for agriculture. And so the land became most important to us: a minimum of 5 acres, decent agricultural soils, at least some area cleared and ready for gardening, not all North facing, ideally with water on site and some trees that might be willing to be lumber or firewood. If the land had a driveway and a drilled well, and accessible electricity – that would be ideal. As we continued to look, not only was it difficult to find these qualities in Vermont, where we were hoping to stay, but they were very competitive – many places we wanted to visit sold before we could even get there. We were also looking in very specific parts of New York, New Hampshire, and Maine, but our focus was on Vermont. Heather had come out as queer since moving to Vermont and had found vibrant, queer poetry and arts community and felt safest in the small state. Land was also the most expensive there.
We began looking in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont, where land was somewhat more affordable and somewhat less in demand. Two of the land parcels we visited had many of the aspects we were seeking, but were on busy paved roads and in remote communities where there had been recent violence against a queer Person of Color.
Heather began reaching out to some of their teachers, mentors, and dearest friends. Heather told them they were longing to be courted for the gifts they could bring to our work and communities. Heather had a few of these conversations, and they were beautiful, but nothing seemed to call us to deepen in at that time. We had begun to worry about moving somewhere without community and we were trying to call community in, to echo our longings out across the waters of space and time. One day, as Heather was walking with and praying to the Brook that flows through the leased land where we lived, a dearly beloved Brook, they felt invited to specifically ask Water for help. A while back our son and Heather had gone to a potion making workshop and were guided through making a “homecoming” potion. Each time we visited a new parcel of land for sale, we brought some of the potion as an offering. That day Heather heard an invitation to offer some of that potion to Brook and ask for help finding home. So they did.
Two days later a dear friend reached out to Heather and a group of other amazing humans to say that there was an incredible opportunity. One quarter of a mile from the friend’s home there was 80 acres for sale down a short dirt road (#77) and the friends that lived next to that land with a house, garage, and another 80 acres would be selling in a few weeks (#30). Here was a chance to cultivate an intentional neighborhood – something these friends had been talking about for years as an exciting model for intentional community building.
This land was in the same county where our family had lived before moving to Vermont. We had found other promising land for sale in Waldo County previously, but Heather always immediately quashed it. “We can’t go back”, they said. Heather didn’t want to go back. For all the reasons we left (aside from the primary financial reasons: we’re “Mountain people, not Ocean people” – eye roll – its hard to grow food there because of disease and pest pressure, poison in the waters and soils, struggling schools, etc.). But when our friend sent us this information Heather brought the land to Tyler’s attention. The land was in 3 separate parcels for a total of 80 acres, it was about 1000 feet from the end of a town discontinued road (but several signs pointed to the fact that the road could, with minor investment, be brought into town maintenance again), it had a concrete pad from a previous house, a drilled well (10 years old) and electricity out to the home site. Plus, it was near the epicenter of local, rural, queer, radical, land-based spiritual community. Tyler had already flagged it as of interest as it had just recently been listed on real estate websites. It was listed at $200,000.
We jumped into action – Tyler began the process of spending a minimum of 40 hours (likely more) over the next week analyzing the land: soil maps, lidar maps, arcGIS maps, satellite maps, tax maps – anything and everything he could find. We made a plan to visit the land the following weekend. We had a zoom call with our friends who had identified that they were interested in exploring this possibility and found beautiful alignment between both the intentional community building and need for boundaries and privacy and “autonomous decision making” zones.
Heather was still grappling with their reservations about moving back to this area. Another friend led them through a guided meditation and discernment practice which was far from conclusive, but led them to notice the sense of expansion they felt in their body about moving towards community in Maine vs. continuing to look in Vermont.
As we prepared for our trip to Maine, everything seemed to come together:
- Our local friend introduced us to a local realtor who was extremely helpful and supportive,
- a review of town regulations supported our intentions for the land,
- Ava (giver of the Gift) quickly provided an updated proof of funds in time to have an offer ready,
- Heather arranged with their job to learn that they would be allowed and likely approved to work remotely from Maine, and
- Our friends met someone whose husband owns a gravel pit and does a lot of work with the town of Freedom and could give us a quote on fixing up the currently un-maintained road.
Things seemed to be aligning.
In their listening practice Heather was receiving lots of powerful messages about taking leaps of faith, about how our actions now determine the future, and about decolonizing our approach to greeting place and finding home.
Soon, we were in Maine visiting the land. Our friends and the realtor met us there. They had gotten a foot of snow the weekend prior and then an inch of rain the prior evening. It was the wettest the place would likely ever be – but we thought it would be good to see the land at that point in late winter/early spring – when agriculture can feel hard to imagine.
Almost immediately things started to go sideways. Heather had been longing to approach the land in a specific way, with deep listening, knowing how close we were to putting in an offer. But our family all seemed to be at odds and could not find a rhythm. It was a tough start. Heather could tell that Tyler was struggling with what he was seeing on the ground, and felt discouraged, unable to deepen into listening.
Despite our best efforts, we were feeling disappointed in the place – the access felt overwhelming (the discontinued road), the need to clean up the place from the previous owner’s mess-making, the lack of presence of Brook nearby, the excessive water moving through low absorption soils. Heather felt the place was sweet and warm and welcoming, but also sad that we weren’t falling in love with them. The whole experience felt disjointed, which they did not know how to interpret – Heather had hoped to find clarity when we visited, did this mean we were not right for the place?
After a delicious, generous, and amazing lunch with friends, we headed towards NH to stay with Tyler’s family. Tyler was discouraged and uninterested in putting in an offer for the land. The soils were very wet, the only small area of possible agriculture soils had seemed too rocky to dig in, most of the 80 acres was wet forest, the old discontinued road had clearly completely overgrown – so access was harder than anticipated. The presence of bedrock close to the surface in many places did not bode well for digging a basement. A few positives: the slab was in good shape, the road would be relatively easy to fix to the home site, and the soil samples Tyler had dug near the house had been easy to dig and seemed deep enough.
As Heather listened they reflected aloud how focused we were on everything the place lacked, and not what it offered. Complete south facing acreage around the home site, a driveway, electricity, a well. One of the only places in the world we actually had enough community to have help building a house – which we were likely going to need to do no matter where we ended up. The possibility of creating a home for others too. They brought up the point of – why should we be “utilizing” all 80 acres? What is enough for us? We discussed this together.
At this point, a certain entitlement had found its hooks in Heather. They didn’t believe there would be other people seriously considering this land. They believed that, because of the signs, it was meant to be. They were arrogant.
We decided to put in an offer. A low offer, $140,000, but an offer. The realtor thought it was worth between $150,000 and $170,000 and we were hoping to come in at the lower end of that range. Neither of us felt particularly excited – there was a lot of sadness about leaving the place we lived and loved and leased in Vermont, and also fear about the massive amount of work we would be taking on. But we believed we had done the right thing. This was the Saturday before Easter, March 31. If the offer was accepted, we would close April 30, 2024.
We waited. We spent time with family for Easter, then came home sunday afternoon. After several months of stressful and challenging times, Heather had arranged to stay in a cabin in the woods for 3 nights and 2 days, starting that sunday afternoon. The cabin was in the woods at Vermont’s Bird Museum, along the Brook they love so well, a short walk from our home at the time. This cabin is called Gale’s Retreat. Gale Lawrence was a well known Vermont naturalist and writer who loved the world and used her gifts to bring people into conversation with the world around them. She bought the old farm that would become the Bird Museum and the associated walking trails and every year on her September birthday (Heather is also September born) she would come to this cabin that her sweetheart built for her to listen, to write, and to retreat from humans for a bit. She would cook food from her garden over an open fire, like Heather was doing. She would dip in the cold, clear Brook, like Heather often did – maybe even in the same deep pool we called Blue Pool. Gale’s dream became something beautiful – a way to protect and share this place that this Brook flows through, where birds find sanctuary, where people can come to imagine different ways of living. Heather thought of Gale often, and felt her close.
That first night Heather heard clearly from Brook – this cabin trip was a gift from the place, an extended goodbye from these lands and waters they loved so much and, truly, wished we did not need to leave. Heather heard how much of our life would open up for us once they stopped working so much (which would be made possible by this move), in this new community far away. As Heather moved through their first evening in the cabin, as they stepped out the door, it felt like a reminder of what we could be moving towards, that soon our whole life could be a little more like this. Heather began to feel happy and excited.
The next day Heather walked home to spend a little time with their family in the afternoon. During the day Tyler had continued to analyze the soils at #77 and learned they are not conducive for growing crops – low absorption of water, wet in spring, dry in summer, high likelihood of trees blowing over (Tyler loves to grow trees). He was feeling discouraged and deeply questioning whether this was the right place for us.
That evening, Monday April 1, Heather heard from the realtor: the seller has multiple offers, there was a hint that ours was low, but all potential buyers are invited to give their best and highest offer by 6pm tomorrow.
Heather returned to the cabin. They worked on themselves – was it time to let go of this opportunity? Because it didn’t have what we wanted? Despite our fears and insecurities and loneliness in the process, they kept coming back to : decolonize your approach. Heather was reading the sacred text Hospicing Modernity for the 3rd time and it invited me to think larger than ourselves and our family. We needed to decenter ourselves and imagine into future possibilities that were outside of our ability to actually imagine. The best possible thing we could do for our son was to think about the whole. Heather truly believed this land in Maine, this community, offered us the possibility of doing that, together.
Tyler and Heather had several painful discussions. Hopelessness, fear, discouragement, and confusion were constant companions.
Heather set up phone calls with Ava and our dear friend who lived in the neighborhood of the land. They went back to the cabin. Brook invited them to dip in Blue Pool but they refused. It was too cold, too painful (march in Vermont!). Heather sat with them and listened, but little else was revealed. If they had dipped – would their sight have been clearer as the day went on? Would their inner voice of modernity and selfishness have stayed at bay when it mattered most?
Heather returned home and talked with Tyler again. We were able to talk through our fears about the amount of work and imperfections and unknowns we were moving towards. We talked through all we had wanted that we would be giving up. We also talked through what we believed was possible. We moved our stake from an offer of $160,000 to $175,000.
In Heather’s phone call with Ava they expressed to her all the ways in which the situation was working us, how many times we had cried, how much we were struggling with this process. Heather expressed to her that they believed this land could keep the gift moving through the world beyond our family, and that even if the land was not FOR our family, this felt like the right thing to do – to push and stretch to make this happen. Heather asked her – if we made a higher offer, if we ended up in a situation where we needed more money to finish a house for our family to live in, if we could find no other way from our friends or family to fundraise – could we come back to her for a smaller 0% loan? Yes, she assured us, and there might even be a possibility of increasing the gift. Her and her partner Gen were open to considering that. Heather cried. The love and trust between us is powerful.
Heather’s next call was to our friend living in the neighborhood currently. Heather asked her to tell them why this mattered. She told Heather of her longings to have a baby and raise them in community, she reminded them of our past conversations about the potential of intentional neighboring, she told the story of her recent big efforts to purchase, protect, and be in deep relationship with land. The ways in which that process had asked her to face fears, the opportunities it had brought to rent and share that place with others. She said to me – if money is the only limiting factor, don’t let it be. Offer the asking price – we can make the difference back between what felt comfortable for you and full price later by selling, renting, anything. Once the land is under our care we can set them free, anything is possible. Go all in. Her biggest fear was that we would regret our choices. She encouraged us to fully embrace Ava’s message and to utilize the gift to do this good in the world, that we had the backing and support we needed to stretch.
Although Heather was skeptical and not able to fully hear our friend’s message to go up to asking price, they did consider it. We moved our stake from $175,000 to $185,000, or $190,000.
Heather called the realtor. And in 1 fell swoop they allowed all my hard work of the day, trying to rise and grow into this moment, fall away. When Heather asked her what she thought about $185,000 the realtor paused. I think it’s too high, she said. I don’t want to be the reason you don’t get it, she said, but I don’t think its worth more than $170,000.
And just like that, Heather quickly allowed themselves to shed the layers of hard work they had gone through all that day, they forgot all the length and breadth of this story we are telling you, and they quickly retreated, backed down, all too happy to fall back into the comfortable, the stingy, the future-less. We forgot to appropriately value the we, the us, and the more-than-us in our refusal to accept the truth, the present, and what was at stake.
We increased our earnest money deposit from $1,000 to $5,000, removed the requirement that the buyer cover the 1% of our realtor’s commission not already covered, and made an offer of $175,000. Within 10 minutes, we had our response from the seller’s realtor.
“I thank you so much for all your work, and I appreciate your client’s amending their previous offer. Unfortunately, we have decided to accept a different offer. All the best to you and your clients.”
That day, we lost a future.
Sorrow, pain, and heartbreak filled us, to which there is only 1 true response: take the pain deep inside until it becomes transformed by courage and love.*
Following that moment, we wrote these words. We prayed, grieved, apologized over and over to land and water that we had faltered, failed, were weak. We have wept, keened, and tried to take this pain deep inside. Because of our actions, we lost one potential future.
All we could do at that point was commit to learning this lesson. Promise ourselves we would do everything in our power to make this mistake only once. We share this story with you: we failed, we screwed up. But we do not get to stop trying. Even in the face of grief, of despair, of hopelessness, it is our work to keep learning, keep trying, keep holding space for that which is possible outside of our ability to imagine it.
That completes the story of #77 (sort of). Part 2.2 is a shorter prose poem version of Part 2.1.
In Part 3, I will tell you how our family came to live at #30.
homesong 