Unexpected Stressors...You Never Know...part one.

2018...I couldn't have known four years ago how our lives would change. We picked up our new Black Lab puppy in Oregon in mid-July... she has been a constant thread of joy to both of us for the last four years. In September we noticed that the one acre of trees and rocks directly south of us, which had been undisturbed for the thirty years since we built our house, was now being disturbed...we had neighbors. The decision had been made to clear-cut the property. All 815 trees were removed. Construction noise right off our deck was new to us. The new owner graciously let us keep two trees that grew on the border of our properties. The earth movers rolled in and fought the rocks and stumps making a construction pad as close to our house as possible. I am still struggling with this gross imposition. The house is now in place but the battle goes on with the huge rocks and the landscaping. Large tractors and cranes are waging this battle even today, as my house shakes and jumps and the pictures on the wall swing cockeyed with every movement of these incredibly noisy machines. The wife says, "He's a dig-a-hole/ fill-a-hole kind of guy." Which may go on for the rest of our lives. In November of that first year Paradise burned...thirty thousand people ran for their lives as a blow torch wind ravaged their entire town. This happened just down the hill from us (fifty miles, as the crow flies) so, we got much of the smoke. Eighty-five people died.