Hello friends, Maddie here. It's been awhile since I posted something.
I see on the earlier posts that thanks to the kindness of friends, there
was quite a little stir caused when my last post was put on the
newsgroup three times. I'm honored! And had no idea those whom I sent
the posts to at the library would be so kind....LOL and of course the
flame was enjoyable to read as well. I knew I was loved, but never knew
how much! Thanks and wish I could hug each and every one of you for
being there for me. You know who you are--

Well, a short update is in order, and here it comes...........those who
do NOT want to read this, close it and move to the next post please....

My life has taken a turn for the incredibly happy and fortunate lately.
Over the last year, I have realized that I was in a terminally deficient
marriage that was verbally abusive and which left me not only
despondent, but had me questioning my reason for even sticking around.
Never mind that I had friends and acquaintances who gave me encouraging
words. Literal words of love and affection from friends whom I've not
met only through the written word, a few phone calls, cards, etc. Those
who were close and could hug me weren't enough either. There was
something seriously lacking.

I was snapped out of my despondency by the incredible realization that
there was someone out there who not only filled the needs of my soul and
heart, but someone who respected me and would love me for everything
that I was and wasn't without question. I stumbled across my true soul
mate, my beshert as the yiddish word is wont to be, the other half. The
missing piece. This man I'd called friend for over four years and who
had kept silent about his own feelings about me, because I had never
told him my anguish and pain through the conversations we had over the
phone. He kept his heart and mouth silent as he realized how much he
cared and felt over the years. He was and still is a gentleman, and
only when he asked my permission when he returned to England to write me
a letter last year, did he reveal his true feelings of love and
affection towards me. My own heart had been shrieking at me for a long
time, but when you're as wounded and tired as I was, one tends to be a
bit wary of what seems at first to be foolishness. And we don't always
listen to our hearts........

But ever the optimist, I had held my tongue merely because I didn't want
to cross a line and run off a true friend. Foolish me! Had I but
opened up like I do to EVERYONE ELSE, I'd have had happiness way sooner
and wouldn't be going through all the anguish and craziness I am
currently going thru.

This man, my heart and other half is a gardener. He writes. He loves
music, and adores me. He has been raising his youngest son (of three)
now for 10 almost 11 of the lad's 16 years now. The teenager is
phenomenal. A rare one in this world today, he's centered and quiet,
focused and his wit is razor sharp. We're bonding like super glue......

The dawgs adore him. Smeagol whines and cries at his door (the boy's)
to sleep with him, and ALL the felines think he's awesome. I am happy
for the first time in my life. It's just strange to have a step son who
is the age of my grand daughters! LOL now a bit of gardening
updates.......

Today we both went outside into crispy Faerie Holler and did some
whacking and lopping of dead, dying and crispy limbs and shoots. The
trumpet vine has been topped and cut. It will return. The yellow ball
buddelia has been cut to the ground. As has one of the two Crispa
spirea. All the rampant shoots of the Sorbaria (False Spirea) were
removed from their attempts at jumping the concrete along side where we
park, and the Cornelia Cherry tree (twig leaf Dogwood) was given a limb
lift, James doesn't like limbs in his face knocking off his glasses.

I watered containers deeply, the sucking sounds were horrible. The only
stalwarts blooming are the swamp sunflowers. Their perky over sized
Coreopsis like blossoms are everywhere. The hummer strafed me as he
searched in vain for nectar in the Blue Enigma salvia. There are
TOMATO'S on the vines I planted whilst talking on the phone to James
when he was still in England back at the end of Spring. Aunt Ruby's
Green and some Sungold cherry tomato's are fast approaching edibility.
I put them in the front faerie gardens....

Obedient plants are blooming as well, the sedums and succulents are
delirious with this dry sucking heat wave we've been trapped in now for
weeks. Frakartii asters are setting buds, I missed one of the fall
colchicum's blooming, hoping I haven't lost the bulbs in the other pots.
As I watered, butterflies lit and supped minerals out of gratitude.
The bird baths refilled were bone dry. I need to make sugar water for
the hummers.........refill the suet baskets with the never melt stuff,
no seeds for them. funds are tight.

I might be losing Faerie Holler, but if I do, I will keep everyone
posted as to where I wind up and where the next location of Faerie
Holler will be. Things are not good on the financial front. Jobs
aren't readily available for myself, nor James, despite his experiences
and maturity. We prevail and expect for things to come out hopefully
good, despite the looming threat of foreclosure and other
things.....divorce is never easy, despite best intentions and lack of
animosity. Nuff said about that, eh?

The faerie's are all hunkered down around here, sulking. Mom's Nature
is culling out the plants I can't take with me. Some beloved things
will NOT be left behind if I lose my home of 12 years. Pruned hard and
dug up after a deep watering and put into nursery pots, I will take them
to Gloria's up in the foothills of Hemlock Holler soon. Some things I
will have to leave behind. I have a mental list of what WILL come no
matter what. I have enough house plants to keep everyone busy in this
house for awhile, and sometimes it's just good to walk outside once the
heat has subsided and listen to the woodpeckers and the squacking of the
hummers as they careen past each other. James has been home with the
woman he loves dearly now for 3 weeks, and I wish with all my heart that
he can experience fall, winter and true spring here. We'll see.........

What I've given him is my love and life for as long as I'm here. And
I've shown him Faerie Holler and given him the magic that it holds each
day he's been here. He's been able to go outside and despite that he
has tenitis, has heard the woodpeckers, cicada's, peepers, and the
silence that offers a peace he'd not known in Bournemouth this past
year. He's wakened up to see Lord Baltimore hibiscus blooming scarlet
red skirts just outside the bedroom window, and watched the antics of
the assorted winged dinosaurs as they squabbled over the suet basket I'd
hung beside the Heavy Metal ornamental grasses. He's seen and smelled
the seven foot 4 o'clocks that hang over the sidewalk out front, and
watched me as I labored to gather seeds of the yellow and not the
magenta.....He's been taken down into the true holler and seen the
potential that we both know it has always had, and if we have the chance
to hang onto it, it will be wondrous......

He's been able to step outside and just feel nature all around him, and
he hears and makes me laugh all the time. Those who meet him, or see us
together claim we appear as if we've been together for decades. We have,
despite the "real time" we know each other very very well.......

The only thing we haven't done yet is garden in the rain....and since
it's so dry, the figs are all covered in ants, so he's only tasted two
so far......I garden now with someone who loves it as much as me, and
someone who works alongside of me easily. We've slipped into each
other's routines and habits like a hand into a glove.

My love and hugs to all of you who hold a special place for me, please
make room for a gentle and kind eyed Englishman who has taken his
rightful place alongside his Maddie........and just off to the side of
him, a mischievous, incredibly blue-eyed young man stands next to his
best friend and partner in jokes and teasings........

I will write as I can.

maddie, up on the very crispy and tinder dry ridge, back in Faerie
Holler, overlooking a hazy English Mountain in Eastern Tennessee, zone
7, sunset zone 36