I'm grateful for home.
It's impossible not to be. It's a wonderful house, in a wonderful place . . . West Marin County, California, out among the bay trees and dairy cows, on your way out to Point Reyes National Seashore.
Here is the front yard in the spring . . . a terrific garden that Clarke has worked on a lot, and I used to (before art world became part of life) . . . and sometimes, we break down and import help. Thank you, Mario!!!!
The backyard in fall. The terraces were built by the original owners . . . an Italian family who used this place for their "country home" outside of San Francisco, and to grow grapes to make wine in the basement during Prohibition. There are still some of the grape vines up at the top of the yard -- today, enjoyed by deer. And now, we grow lavender, instead -- much loved by the bees we keep. (More on those gals tomorrow.)
Three happy things in a backyard: a clothesline, a vegetable garden plot . . . and a set of pull-up bars. 
A fall shot of the front yard . . . a persimmon tree who offers up her little orange lanterns of fruit. 
I am so grateful for this happy house, where we've lived since 2003. I'm grateful to be able to be its caretakers -- to have had the resources to take it back to its solid, sweet 1920s farmhouse status, after some decades of inattention. I'm grateful for all the old fruit trees, for the new things we've planted, for the creek that runs down through the side (even though it floods the old garage), for all of the places and times this property offers for quiet retreat and for celebratory joy, for all of the house's wood and stone that keeps us safe and dry and warm through wet and wild West Marin winters . . . and I am grateful for the very heart of this place. THANK YOU, HOME!!!! You are the only house I have every truly loved. Thank you for that!
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