The Blind Thistle

I knew when we packed up and left the big city for the countryside things would be different…

I just didn’t realize how drastically different they would be.

Let’s start by stating the obvious shall we? Cleaner air, less noise, fewer distractions and more time spent in nature. Sooooo awesome right? What took me by surprise was the realization that by spending more time in the Great North, I all of a sudden developed allergies to everything! Grass, pollen, fresh air, plants, people…I’m kidding, I’m not allergic to people, it’s more like I’m a little “averse” to them (but we’ve talked about this before). Nowadays I have to take two kinds of medication before stepping foot out the door in the morning otherwise I am a sneezing, sniffling, puffy-eyed mess. Doesn’t bode well to be showing symptoms like these during Covid-19 times!

Another difference: no home-delivery or groceries. Wait…what? No piping hot pizza waiting for me on my doorstep? Nope, we have to drive a minimum 20 minutes to get some food. Or alcohol. Or medication. Anything! Because I don’t drive I have embraced cycling everywhere and have become quite fond of it actually. So Bonus points for helping the environment!

Let me ask you this: How do you like the dark? The community that we settled in is a low-lighting community. That means we do not contribute to “light-pollution”. A random street lamp is permitted but beyond that? Nada. (I didn’t even know “light pollution” was thing). Now, let me explain just how dark it is up here. The first night we moved in, we drove into the driveway, turned the car and headlights off, get out of the car and stopped dead…we could not find the house. I. Kid. You. Not. We had to break out the lights on our trusty smartphones to help us find the way. A neighbour once told us he tried to walk to his garage one night and after taking a few steps he realized couldn’t see his garage, that was in fact, attached to his house.

Finally, the thing that surprised me the most was how much I didn’t actually miss all the conveniences of the big city. You learn to be better organized by planning all your shopping and errands needs in one trip. Instead of going to the movies we can set up a screen in our own spacious backyard and enjoy it while sitting under the stars. I have the space to grow a lot of my own food now so I don’t need to go to the grocery store once a week to pick up fresh produce and vegetables.

We have learned to be more self-reliant.

We have learned to take things slower.

We are more relaxed.

Most of all, we are inherently happier.