Eleven years and a few months ago, Richard Cabe, the man I had loved for almost three decades, died of brain cancer. We met in graduate school in Laramie, Wyoming, when I was in my 20s, went on one date, and a few months later, I married him and his four-year-old daughter, Molly.
And then promptly packed Molly and as many of our belongings as we could fit into a Subaru hatchback and left for West Virgina, where Richard had a faculty position at West Virginia University.
Two semesters later, we packed ourselves back into that same Subaru and headed west again, landing in Olympia, Washington, where we both worked in state government, and Molly discovered the joys of digging for geoducks, a treehouse in the back yard, and licking slugs (yes, they do numb your tongue!).
Until three years later, when we moved back to the Rockies, to Boulder, Colorado, so that Richard could finish his PhD. In our year there, I wrote my first book, Pieces of Light, A Year on Colorado’s Front Range, a year’s journal of nature and humans in Boulder.
From Boulder, we headed east to Ames, Iowa, for Richard’s post-doc at Iowa State University, in a rental truck with Molly riding between us in the front seat, and our old Volvo station wagon in tow. After two years, Richard scored a professorship at New Mexico State University, so off we headed to Las Cruces in our new (old) Volkswagen camper bus.
Seven years later, after I wrote five books about the North American deserts and Molly graduated from high school, we packed our household and our Sharpei, Perdida, into another rental truck, and set off to return to the Rockies and the small town of Salida, Colorado, where Richard had lived in his childhood. Molly drove our Isuzu SUV, towing a trailer loaded with overflow from the rental truck.
After fifteen years in Salida, I had written six more books and Richard had fulfilled two life dreams–building us a house mostly with his own hands and pursuing abstract sculpture. And then brain cancer altered our paths. (I chronicled that journey in Bless the Birds: Living with Love in a Time of Dying, my 13th book.)
In the aftermath of Richard’s death, I realized two things: I was deeply in debt and I needed to figure out how to earn a living in a hurry after taking two years off to care for him and my mom, who died in the same year. At least as important, after spending nearly three decades adapting to the people I loved and their needs, I didn’t know who I was as a solo adult.
Because of the debt, I had to sell the house Richard built for us, but never finished, and the adjacent historic studio, also not finished. (As a sculptor, mundane stuff like trimming windows, installing baseboard and interior doors, or building cabinet doors and drawers, and finishing bathrooms was not interesting.)
Friends patiently taught me how to use tools and materials to finish both the studio and the house over two years (you know who you are, and you have my sincerest thanks forever!). In the doing, I discovered that I loved learning how buildings worked, and envisioning what they needed.
So once I sold Terraphilia, the big house and the studio, I helped design and build a small house and detached garage with guest studio above. I had never designed a space just for me, and in the process, I learned as much about myself as I did about construction.
Once Creek House and its companion, Treehouse, were finished though, I realized that Salida no longer felt like home. In fact, I was no longer was sure where home was–other than somewhere in the Rocky Mountain region where sagebrush grows.
So I headed back to northwest Wyoming, the last place I had felt at home before going to grad school and meeting Richard and Molly. I bought a once-beautiful mid-century modern house in Cody that, after three decades of neglect, needed a lot of love. My contractor and I spent the next two years bringing it back to life, and then, during the hard winter after my dad died, I sold it and headed south to Santa Fe, where the winters are milder and I have a circle of close writing friends.
In Santa Fe, I bought and re-storyed two condos, one to live in and one to rent, and then sold both and moved out of town to a house with good bones but in need of a lot of love. (The Guy, who I had met in Wyoming that August, drove to Santa Fe to help me move.)
A year later, after finishing Casa Alegría, my real estate sense said it was time to cash out, and my heart wanted to make one more try at Wyoming, so I sold the Casa and headed back to Cody. (Are you dizzy yet?)
Where I bought an ordinary ranch house in desperate need of updating, overlooking the Shoshone River in Cody. I was partly through re-storying that house when, on Thanksgiving weekend, a couple knocked on my door and asked if I would consider selling.
Which I took as a sign from the universe, so I put the house on the market, and ten days later, it sold.
Which is why a year ago, I moved again, this time to the little cottage I had bought as a winter writing escape in Montrose, Colorado, about an hour from the Guy’s farm. The cottage had a partially collapsed foundation and other serious needs, so I spent the rest of the winter and spring giving it a new lease on life, and then left to work at Ring Lake Ranch for the summer.
When I returned to the cottage after Labor Day, I had to admit it was too small for me at 672 square feet. So I finished re-storying it, and sold it to a single-mom teacher looking for a cozy and affordable place to raise her daughter.
And I bought a hundred-year-old bungalow in Paonia, a smaller and quieter town than Montrose. Twice the size of the Montrose cottage, with a two-car garage and a shady yard, it seemed like a place I could settle. Of course, it needed a little work.
I happily thinned trees and shrubs in the overgrown yard, oversaw the installation of photovoltaic panels on the roof, dug out under the floors so my contractor could crawl under and shore up sagging floor beams, and generally gave the place the love it needed. (Including the beautiful new front door in the photo at the top of the post.)
Only, and we’re getting to the end of the long story here, I realized that while I enjoy this house and yard, and the charming town of Paonia in this green valley of orchards and small farms, it is not home.
I’m a desert rat: I need sun and sagebrush and wildness nearby to walk. And at 66 years old, I no longer need (or want) the responsibility for a house and a yard. I need more time to write.
So I’m going to put my newly re-storyed Paonia bungalow up for sale and settle into a sunny condo at the north edge of Santa Fe, with coyotes singing from the nearby ridges, and a view of the Sangre de Cristo Range from my back deck. And someone else doing the maintenance!
I’ll visit the farm and Paonia in summers, and the Guy and the horses will come south in winter to a barn outside Santa Fe, a seasonal migration of sorts within our mutual home range, where sagebrush grows wild and mountains line at least one horizon. For me, now, that all feels just right.
Julie Weston says:
Oh my, Susan. You take my breath away! Good luck with this new place. Miss you and love you. I’m glad Guy is still part of your life
Susan Tweit says:
Thank you, Julie! All is good. The Guy and I just have a non-traditional relationship that allows us each to follow our own paths. It works well for us. And I’m looking forward to settling in my sunny condo and writing away…. 🙂
Rebecca Conrad Lawton says:
Lovely, Susan. Your wandering and searching and settling all sound so true to your heart. Much love to you.
Susan Tweit says:
Becca, thanks so much! Perhaps you’ll visit Santa Fe one of these years, and we can catch up in person. Hugs back to you.
Kathleen Vilim says:
Good for you! You deserve every happiness!
Susan Tweit says:
Thank you, Kathy! I am feeling quite blessed. And I’m looking forward to using my chain saw to remove Siberian elms from the nearby arroyo, and do some native plant seeding. 🙂
Laura says:
You are a whirling dervish of accomplishment! Amazing.
Susan Tweit says:
Either that or I’m bat-shit crazy! Sometimes I’m not sure which. 😉
Chery Kendrick says:
Search for home and self is such a wonderful journey. I have so enjoyed watching yours. Your growth and path of self discovery have been so inspiring.
I love the happiness you have found and you know I think no traditional relationships rock!
I am so excited that you are returning your desert rat bones back to your beloved NM desert.
Much love, dear friend 🙏🏼🙌🏼❤️😊👍
Susan Tweit says:
Thank you, Chery! I so appreciate your understanding and your support. I think I’m pretty fortunate to have make it this far in life and learned and experienced so much along the way. And I am very excited about returning to the high desert, especially after shoveling another dump of snow from my walks and driveway this morning. Love back to you!
Lindy says:
Dear Susan, both Julie and Doc said it best and I’m both not surprised by another move and surprised this move involves a condo. Wishing you great good luck and the wonderful freedom to write.
Susan Tweit says:
Lindy, I am over being responsible for a house and a yard! I’m looking forward to perhaps one more house re-storying project, but for a friend, not my own. And I’m looking forward to using my new chain saw to remove Siberian elms from the neighboring arroyo. 🙂
Michael Roberts says:
Dizzy. But an enjoyable journey with a liberated (positive word) woman seeking identity after loss. Your tactile endeavors, restorying, amaze me. Thank you for sharing. I am more a Taos fan but do appreciate Santa Fe.
“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will.”
~Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre
Susan Tweit says:
Michael, Thanks for the Jane Eyre quote–it’s certainly appropriate! I like Taos too, but I wouldn’t want to live there. Too much anger and ugliness under the surface. Santa Fe is complicated, but very livable.
Kathryn Timpany says:
What a delightful journey! Thanks for including us!
Susan Tweit says:
Kathryn, You are so welcome. I write memoir in hopes that my journey will be useful to others. 🙂
Cindy says:
An incredible journey. I cannot even begin to imagine so many homes given so much love, and then left. Your skills, talents and energy are admirable. So sorry about your husband. Mine died of Alzheimers, and then a lover died of Glioblastoma, so I know how painful your loss was. I am now left w/ one house my husband designed and built. He was a master of the universe, could build or fix anything. I pride myself on 6 years alone, keeping it together. Nothing compared to your journey. I’m almost 74, and don’t know what’s next. A desert condo huh? Thanks for sharing this. ( @gemswinc )
Susan Tweit says:
Cindy, I am so sorry about your husband and your lover. Two deaths, both from such difficult illnesses–that’s huge to weather. Kudos to you for those six years alone, keeping the house and your life together. What’s next might be something radically different than Long Island, I imagine. Or not. Only you know, and I send my sympathy and support for wherever the road takes you!
Vi and Ron Cauthon says:
Susan, Ron and I admire your stamina, your willingness to work with your hands in those many restorations but we do agree – since we’re two decades older than you are – that it’s time to lessen the physical labor. Use your time to continue writing. We know you’ll use your time in Santa Fe to soak up sun and nature. Your views are beautiful. Vi and Ron Cauthon (P.S. At the age of 87, I finally completed and printed “family stories” for our children.)
Susan Tweit says:
Vi, Kudos to you for completing those family stories for your grown-up kids! I know they’ll treasure them. As for the physical work, it keeps me young. I just want to do less of it! 😉 Hugs to you and Ron!
Tom Thornburg says:
Reading this, I discovered I was one place behind on your journey! Love your energy and perseverance always, S.
Susan Tweit says:
Hah hah! Who can keep track? Sometimes I forget where I am myself, which is one reason I’m retiring from house re-storying and settling down. 🙂 I hope all’s well, Tom, and you’re enjoying teaching again.
Cyndi Nelson says:
Susan
Enjoyed your chronicles over the years.
Happy for your new abode and more time to write and explore!
Thanks for including folks like me on the periphery looking in!
Cyndi Nelson
Susan Tweit says:
Cyndi, Thanks for reading, and for your support. I’m excited about the move, and happy to be settling at last. Finally!
Susan Kask says:
What a journey. I have known you throughout all these moves and watched in wonder as you re-story each place to beauty with so much love. Is the outline of a new book? Wishing you tons of love and ease in this next move. xoxxooxo
Susan Tweit says:
Thanks, Susan! The next book, Practicing Terraphilia, is not about my re-storying (except perhaps one chapter), but someday I’ll write Tool Girl: Adventures in Re-storying Houses. Maybe that’s the book after Terraphilia. I have to get moved and get back to writing first! Hugs, S
Roberta West says:
Well … I know know your plans … for now anyway. I’m not at all surprised that you are coming back to Santa Fe. It seems you’ve decided writing is what you want to be doing for now, not re-modeling another home. Once you are settled in we can lunch at Sweetwater and you can tell me more stories!! Hugs
Susan Tweit says:
I am definitely ready to retire from moving, tending a yard, and all that! I’ll look forward to seeing you at Sweetwater for lunch once I get moved. (Which will likely be another month or so.) Hugs back!
Priscilla Stuckey says:
Omigoodness, Susan, dizzy, yes! Found myself hollering silently, Make it stop! Make it stop! 😀 But of course that’s just me, who had to move way more often than I wanted to. In a few weeks we will have been at our current cottage longer (3.5 years) than anyplace else in 19 years. That was a lot of moving. Especially for an autistic person with a STRONG preference for things staying the same. Who knew it would lead us here? It’s a continuing source of awe and wonder to us. And what a string of loved and strong and beautiful homes you leave in your wake! That’s some good work in the world! Blessings on your new place in Santa Fe. And I can confirm that it’s sweet to have someone else look after the property. Hope you enjoy this new sweet place!
Susan Tweit says:
First, I am so delighted that your current cottage there in magical Hawai’i is still a source of wonder and awe, and that you are NOT moving. Also that you have learned so much about yourself and found ways to be even more your own blessed self with that knowledge. And second, thank you for those good wishes. I am sitting in my Paonia house among boxes, with more to pack, appreciating this place and wishing the best for whomever this now-happy house adopts for its own. This re-storying has indeed been good work, and it has also taught me a lot about me. I will be home in my sunny condo in Santa Fe in a week, and I am very ready to be there.
Rain Trueax says:
Amazing number of changes but all with an unknown direction that did seem part of a creative life. Good luck with the sale and your new life.
Susan Tweit says:
Thank you, Rain! It made me dizzy to sketch out that whole zig-zagging route, but the truth is, I was always heading home to Santa Fe. I just had to try out a bunch of other places that will always hold pieces of my heart before coming back. And I had to wait until the perfect home came up, and that happened to be in November, when I drove to Santa Fe to see what it felt like. So home I am, and I just have to sell the Paonia house before I go broke. 😉 Blessings to you.
G Dave Dixon says:
Susan, I’d love your picture of years ago with your long red hair. You definitely have had some vennerstrom genes in you just as my wife Carol did. She had light red hair just like yours. I wish you could’ve met her when you were in Kansas City. I trust you will find stability and time to write in Santa Fe. My new wife, Lydia, and I are enjoying our life here together in Sun City.
Susan Tweit says:
Hi, Dave, I will email you a couple of photos of me from when my hair was still red. I definitely have Vennerstrom genes since I got them from my mom, and I also get the red hair from my Tweit side, as my great-aunt Sigrid and my great-uncle Amund both had that same color of red hair! I’m glad that you and Lydia are enjoying life in Sun City.