“…what has the deepest and most permanent effect upon oneself and one’s way of living is the house in which one lives. The house determines the day-to-day, hour-to-hour, minute-to-minute quality, colour, atmosphere, pace of one’s life; it is the framework of what one does, of what one can do, and of one’s relations with people.”
Leonard Woolf
This quote.....not by Vita, Virginia, nor Vanessa.....but by Leonard Woolf eloquently captures how at home I've become in where I live; the bay area, my Orinda house, and my northern California garden. My small Silverado house and surrounding garden had a profound effect on me. They taught me how to dwell on a small scale. How to accommodate for towering canyon walls and limited sunshine in my garden for at least three months of each year. How to weather the extremes of heat, fire, frost, and flood. That experience, that environment, and the memory of that wild and undomesticated space will live with me forever.
But day-to-day, hour-to-hour, minute-by-minute, this unique Orinda house and unpredictable garden is providing a new framework for my life: for what I do (and won't do); for my continuing relationships with close family; for evolving experiences with my curious, creative and imaginative grand-daughters; for creating interesting life spaces for new friends; and for old friends......keeping them close to the heart in deep and abiding love and affection.
