How We Ended up in PEI in the First Place

We moved to PEI four years ago. It was certainly a big move from urban BC to rural PEI. Despite what it says in my blog description, it's not really 'the wilds', just feels that way to this city-slicker sometimes.

The idea of living more simply appealed to us. We often talked about growing our own food and how nice it would be to have a little hobby farm. What did we know of rural life? Not a whole lot by any stretch of the imagination. We both lived in towns or suburbs all our lives. What I knew of farming come from my moms' side of the family. Some of my fondest memories are visiting my grandparents (Hilda & Bernie) on the farm where my mom grew up. My grandparents taught me the joy of farm life simply by living it. Don liked the idea of being more self-sufficient. He always had a interest in running a hotel and so naturally the prospect of perhaps having a B&B when he retired was very appealing.

As in most long-held dreams, the practical realities were virtually ignored. Ah, we'd figure out the septic system, well water, etc when we got there. My visions included me bending over a well tended patch of garden, lovingly picking some tender vegetable for that night's supper, or basket in hand, picking wildflowers in the sunshine. Fighting with a stubborn wood furnace, kids grouching about having to weed 'all the time'and power outages that meant the water well didn't work didn't even figure in my scheme of things.

One day Don wandered into the kitchen one day and said, "There's a job in PEI that sounds good, what do you think?" "Oh sure," says I, "I always wanted to retire in PEI." Now, that might sound a little blase, and the truth be known, it was. This wasn't the first time Don considered change. He had mentioned several locations over the years, including Australia and China. I have learnt to go with the flow. Sometimes we move, most times we don't. But he landed the job, so good-bye day-dreams, hello reality. We went in the dead of winter. In the middle of school. When it's cold in PEI. Less than a month's notice. When there's snow in PEI. But the kids being homeschooled helped a lot. I work well under pressure so a month's time was more than ample. Unfortunately, there's wasn't much I could do about the time of year (when it was really cold).

My remark about wanting to retire in PEI was actually true. I had visited PEI as a young child. I was about 10 or so. Right in the middle of reading the "Anne" books and I found the whole island to be magical from the red sands to the patchwork of fields stitched with old wooden fences. When I was in my twenties, I decided to vacation again in PEI. Everyone told me wouldn't be the same, it would be magical anymore because I was no longer a child. But it was still as magical to me and I left wanting to retire here. Hey, when you find magical, you hang on to it.

The idylic vision of living in a beautifully restored (by us, no less) old farmhouse turned into cold, cold hard realization that for every one thing we knew about that had to be fixed, updated or restored, there were ten things we didn't know about that had to be done. Cold facts and cold farmhouse - not much insulation way back when. Organic gardening involves a lot of mucking around in compost and (shudder) manure, battling bugs and trying to convince the cat that the gardens are not her personal king-size litterboxes salted around our property for her convience. And boy, does the list go on...and on...and on... And yet, the magic, the dream, is still here inspite or may-be even because it is now tempered with reality, challenge, and best of all, fulfilment.