Whenever I’m asked to imagine living my best possible life, I always picture myself at home. In my dream I make money from writing, so I don’t need to be anywhere else. I used to imagine myself waking up in a massive A-frame cabin, writing at dawn, then taking my dog for a walk in the woods with coffee in hand. I’d wander back home, have breakfast with my family and then spend some time outside in my lush garden, where I’d write more in the quiet hours of morning. Afternoons would be devoted to entertaining visitors. I might leave at some point to fetch groceries for dinner, but my vision of those outward journeys have always been fuzzy. That action takes place offstage. In my fantasy, home is always the center of my daily activities.

It’s a funny thing having bought a house for the first time in my late 40s, because it’s changed the architecture of my dream. I no longer envision the A-frame at the edge of the woods (maybe that can be a vacation home for a more elaborate fantasy of wealth). I’m pretty enamored with the house we got. It’s in a subdivision of similarly shaped ranch style houses about a ten minute drive from downtown – not on the edge of the woods, though just a ten minute walk from a greenway trail that winds along a creek toward the city center. On mornings when I have enough time between dropping my daughter off at school and the start of my shift, I hike the long distance between home and the store where I work. My journey begins in a wetland zone with patches of ponds, damp fields, and trees. Eventually my path leads me to Old Salem, a historic Moravian settlement established 250+ years ago. I love everything about this long walk – the sights, the time to myself, the exercise, the limited automobile traffic, and the way my legs create this seamless transition between my house and my destination. Until I cross the threshold of my workplace, it all feels like home to me. 

If I ever get to the point of subsisting on a writer’s income, I’m sure I’ll have plenty to occupy the time I once spent walking to work. There’s the garden, for starters. In my vision I picture verdant abundance, but again the details are a bit fuzzy. In fact I’ve just started gardening for the first time in my life and have almost no idea what I’m doing. My plan is to just follow my friend PG’s advice – “Embrace the chaos. Throw seeds around and see what happens. Stuff will grow!” It’s an act of faith when my daughter and I bust the ground with shovels and tear up sod like we’re ripping up a stubborn old shag carpet. There’s dirt there, and we got ourselves some seeds and manure. I figure something green is bound to emerge.

As far as the indoors of my house are concerned, I’ve got that part pretty well handled. I had the good fortune of staying home with my daughter during her toddler years and commonly refer to that as my “houseboss” era. Homemaker pay sucks, but the work itself can be pretty satisfying. I enjoy tending to the place where I want to be as much as possible. I’ve memorized recipes and developed strategies for knocking out dishes and laundry expeditiously. Now that I’m clocking in 40 hours per week elsewhere, I’ve learned to accept clutter as a necessary evil. The kitchen stays messy much of the time. I just think of it as a laboratory, and I’m a wacky scientist who’s too busy to bother with upkeep.

My favorite homebody haunt is probably my couch. It’s L-shaped with a giant ottoman where I can store sweaters in summer and bathing suits in winter. My big, comfy sofa is where I view my shows while sipping mocktails or half-watch Murder She Wrote episodes while I fold laundry. Oftentimes it’s where I write my journal pages first thing in the morning, and where I sip my herbal tea at the end of the night. I decorate it with various throw blankets that I pull from a basket in the corner of the room, my wicker bucket of cozy. 

For as long as my husband and I have lived together – 18 years this autumn – I’ve tried to make our living space warm and inviting. Our location changed many times over the years, We’ve had various pets and raised a child, too. I always thought of home as a combination of our collective energy and all the stuff we’ve acquired. Now we have this defined, somewhat permanent space where we can really let it all flourish. And so I get to imagine what it would look like in this “best life vision” I entertain from time to time. The template is here. Now we get to create the rest.