It has been one year today since I first met you. You greeted me, “ Ciao Bella,” and with that I was hooked. You knew how to make a girl feel welcome and loved, not to mention beautiful and sustained. As you opened your arms, I saw glittering lights overhead with natural light beaming in from a distance. My heart skipped a beat, and I felt my eyes fill with tears. You knew what I needed—how, I will never know—and right before my eyes, the culprits beamed with delight.

You consorted with another (thank you isn’t enough) to create perfection in hues of blues and greens, and that relationship is one that will stand the test of time. Even when Len or I are not in the equation, you and these two will be best of friends. We are a wonderful party of five.

We couldn’t wait to discover ever inch of you, from the corners in the hallways to the beams in the ceiling. I couldn’t believe mama’s spirit sat in the middle of the kitchen, wooden benches with fresh stain and sanding, bringing mama’s Trade School project back to life. In the bathroom, that sewing machine—now a bathroom vanity—that I cussed and cussed over while trying to thread its bobbin. The quilt that hangs on the ladder in my screened in porch, off my office, bears squares of multicolored material that once ran through the machine’s fingers. Works of art decorate your walls, all images shot by my wonderful husband. Books (including two that I had written) run up the wall of the masterful library created in love by her designer. Touches of Palermo kiss the kitchen backsplash; my cream-colored, scratched-metal, with only three-tires Fiat toy (it took two trips to the street market in Palermo to get it) welcomes me to my office; the deck offers a place for our waltz during evenings once the twinkle lights pop to life.

A year later, every day seems new. I’m still over the moon that I get to call this mountaintop home. Just the two of us, with three kitties that, ultimately, rule the roost, far away from a chaotic world that is nothing that it once was. Our days are defined by editorial deadlines and what’s for dinner. Nothing more; well maybe, is it the night we sit at Aqua Tiki, right on the water, surrounded by the Blue Ridge Mountains, drink our usual (spicy and sunset margaritas) with a side of boiled peanuts, and watch boat people. Now, that’s living.

We are home, and daily, we rise with gratitude for this blessing we’ve been given - a result of our hard work and infinite dreams. Never doubt the impossible is possible if you put feet to those dreams. I was told once-upon-a-time that I needed to stop dreaming because I was crazy.

Well, alrighty. I’m the BEST kind of crazy, and as long as there’s breath in me, this kind of crazy I’ll be. Right here on my mountain, once called Possum Hollow, now known as Ivet’s Vista.

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