I cannot sleep well these days. My nights a full of disturbing dreams and I toss and turn in the little bed I share with Wakana. Right now it is 5:00 AM and I find I am done with the night. I didn't get to bed until after midnight. I know why this is. Our visit to The Farm is almost over. In two days we resume our travels. I must take Wakana away from here and back on the road back to Guam.

The Farm has captured Wakana. She has loved it from the moment we arrived. I think she would be perfectly happy to stay here if it could be arranged. She wanders around with a big smile on her face absorbing the atmosphere, breathing in the aromas and environment that makes up The Farm.

I don't blame her. My family has been here since the 1960s. It has developed its own brand of magic. Others, not just family members, have commented that the house just seems to hug you when you walk through the door. It's true. There is a comfort that seems to come from the walls and floor. The roof keeps out more than weather.

To start with there is the location. The Farm sits on top of a steep rise from the road. The driveway crosses a railroad track and rises, rutted and rough, to the red two story old Maine farmhouse. There is a big old birch tree at the top across the driveway from the house and an old two-car garage straight ahead. I cannot remember the left door ever working on that garage. There is a workbench built across it now. It houses the riding lawn mower and Dad's toy, a four wheel ATV he uses to travel the fields and woods to keep track of changes and uses.

On arrival you park in the dooryard. The house would be considered large in the rest of the world but not by New England standards. The main body of the house is a simple rectangle of two full floors with a story and a half ell that holds the kitchen and Dad's den. There is a sun porch and laundry room that used to be a full open porch.

A note about terms. In New England you park the car in the dooryard. It is close to the door used as the entrance to the house. The entrance of the house is NOT necessarily the front door. Generally the front door is a formal entrance and is not used as an entrance at all. A sun porch is one that was previously open but is now enclosed in glass.

Connected to the ell is another two-car garage, this one newer. There is a gap and then the wood shed and stable. Then, standing by itself and looking as though it were ready to collapse, is the old milk house. The big barn came down years ago and would have filled the area between the stable and the milk house. The whole ensemble made a right angle of buildings with its back to the north and west, the direction of the fiercest storms of winter.

Arrival at the farm, if you are family and have been gone for a long time, is a huge celebration. Driving up the hill you honk the horn to announce your arrival. You are greeted in the dooryard by barking excited dogs and people coming out of the house. Hugs are exchanged, dogs bark and run in excited circles, and the house fills with the happy excited voices of the new arrivals.

I imagine this must be a very unusual experience for a newcomer. As I said there is a special brand of magic here. The house is full of bric-a-brac. And it isn't the modern dust collectors that fill other houses. There are not little glass figurines in glass cases. No collections of matchbooks or bar coasters. There are none of those things you might find in modern houses. Here each item has a story and it yearns to be told. You might visit a thousand homes and not find such an interesting bunch of objects as here at The Farm.

I just tried to sit in the kitchen and list the items I might include in a description of The Farm. It is a daunting task. There is so much to look at and so many stories to be told. Many of the stories begin with "Dad made this…" or "Dad found this and fixed it…" There are carved birds, gnome houses, ship models and old clocks. There are two gun racks in the den full of muzzle loading rifles that Dad either built or repaired. The walls are festooned with pictures, prints of famous paintings, family members new and old (the older ones date from the 19th century), favorite dogs, old maps, hunt scenes (Mom is nuts about hunt scene paintings), and art work by family members down through the years (from Mom's Dad to current grandchildren).

Mom worked very hard to make each room special, painting, papering, and stenciling. There are four bedrooms with seven beds in them plus a big plush couch and a sofa bed in the den. With cots and other sleeping arrangements we have housed fifteen people in the place for Christmas or Thanksgiving.

This time of year, September and October, are special in and of themselves. The days are warm, the nights chilly, and the air seems to have a special clarity that speaks to the mind of change and the need to prepare. It is a last chance to enjoy the outdoors of summer before the cold and snow bring another form of beauty to the place. The trees are changing and the hills now wear skirts of swirling color. Every year we comment that the colors aren't as good this year but every year we look and enjoy and soak up the autumn.

Yesterday we woke and looked sleepily at the windows. They were gray and Wakana shivered thinking it was frost. When I told her it was fog she bounded out of bed and into her clothes. She was outside and had several pictures taken before I could catch up. We walked out into the back looking at the fog and the sun coming up to burn it off.

Wakana is full of boundless enthusiasm. Everything is amazing to her. She hangs on every word Dad says, asking questions that he is so happy to answer. And there is so much to ask about. She saw some birch bark boxes Dad had made and wanted to make some herself. She is now busy in Dad's shop soaking spruce roots and folding birch bark. She takes a "break" by painting pictures of this house and my sister's house, another that she loves. I have an image in my mind's eye of her and Dad out by the old garage looking at a box of rocks, fossils he had picked up somewhere. Every morning she takes her coffee and walks out into the yard to smell the air and walk the boundaries. The dog, Py, accompanies her.

Py is a mixed breed golden retriever. Because she is not a pure bred golden retriever they named her Pyrite, i.e., fool's gold. She is one of the most spoiled dogs on earth. She is the only dog I know that is fussy about food. My mother has spoiled her so that she thinks she needs a biscuit whenever Mom comes into the room. She gets a plate of leftovers from the supper table every night. Once Wakana made up a dish of the only food left, the skins of the acorn squash, and mixed it with the dry dog food. Py carefully ate only the squash skin and left the dry food for later. When Dad makes up the plate she watches him very carefully. Once he has it done he'll look at her and ask her if she thinks the cats should have it. Py growls and barks, wagging her tail until her whole body is involved in the movement. He keeps asking and calling the cats while Py keeps insisting she should have the food.

When we got here my parents had a horse, Erie, who they were watching for my sister. After a couple of weeks Erie went home. Wakana cried at the loss of her new friend. She had been feeding Erie the cornhusks and cobs after our suppers and had grown to love the old horse. She called her Blossom for some reason. Judging from that reaction she will be a basket case when we leave The Farm.

Wakana has worked hard here, claiming to be having fun. Mom commented once about weeding the flower bed at the border of the house. Wakana went out next morning and started in. It took her several days but she got the whole thing weeded and ready for planting. When Mom mentioned getting the house cleaned up for my sister's arrival (Today!) from Tennessee she went to work with the vacuum cleaner doing a better job than had been done in a long time. My parents love her. They have welcomed her into the family with open arms.

My sisters tell the story of when my Dad was all hopped up on sodium pentathol after his big operation a couple of years ago. They asked him who his favorite son was and he named my brother-in-law! I think now my sisters have been eclipsed by an in-law.