There is a little place we like to call the Farm. Situated out in the middle of nowhere to those who don't get that the country is just as much a somewhere as the city or anywhere else, my family has built a house that overlooks a huge meadow and contains a pond and about a thousand trails in the woods. I grew up going to this place that my mother's family owns. I talk about it frequently on this blog because it's the place my family goes to get away from it all and to just relax. Oddly enough, even when the place is packed with my entire family and spouses and dogs, it's still easy to find a quiet corner to be by yourself and read a book or work a crossword puzzle. Which is the only place I find myself doing crosswords, I might add. And there are always people in quiet corners doing just that. There are also always people out playing badminton or riding 4weirds, as B calls them. And my dad can ALWAYS be found on the back of Big Blue, the monstrous Ford tractor that he uses to blaze trails and haul trees or whatever else he thinks needs to be done from his perch on the tractor. Since he doesn't have the bulldozer that he so desperately longs for. Someday, Dad, it's yours!

It's a place where my mom doesn't have to do all the dishes and my Grandmother can fall asleep sitting up in a rocking chair after laughing hysterically at Planes, Trains and Automobiles. This past weekend, most of us convened there to enjoy Labor Day Weekend.

Turns out, we had company. In the form of a bazillion fire ants. I think I may have been the only person who was not personally assaulted by the little devils, and that is only because I rarely ventured from the house! (good books and a baby) It seriously became hilarious to hear someone yelp in pain, do the "fire ant dance" whereupon one starts leaping about with high knees, slapping furiously at ankles to dislodge any biters. Someone else would come running with the killing powder and wipe out the colony.

The Farm evokes so many memories for me. As I said, I grew up going there during the summers, on holidays, whenever we needed to get away. My Grandmother hauled as many of us as she could for her church's Bible School every summer. And boy, those weeks are just oozing memories! Of the old farmhouse which is now mainly inhabited by wasps. There were endless games of Annie, Annie Over around the little sheds...the summer the woods flooded with about 3 feet of water and we hauled my Grandfather's fishing boat down to the water and paddled our way along the trails...swimming in the pond, swatting horse flies away and sinking toes into the cold muck at the bottom of the pond (ok that wasn't me)...eating my Grandma's homemade fried pies, fried chicken and homemade ice cream...riding 4wheelers through the trails...it's a magical place.

It's always bittersweet to leave, as I told my mom today. I love to come back to my house, but I hate to leave the Farm. I'm so glad it's there and I love what it represents to my family and to me.