Barnheart

by Jenna Woginrich

  Moral victories notwithstanding, time was running out for me to figure out a plan for moving, and that scary fact was punctuated when I came home from work one day in early January to find in my mailbox a letter from my landlord. It told me that I would officially be asked to vacate the cabin and not to be alarmed at the certified letter that was coming my way. I knew this was coming. I had been warned by the landlord herself, over the phone.

  Still, my stomach felt hollow, as if I were in a plane going through turbulence, or I’d accidentally missed the bottom step leaving the house. I stood outside in front of the Subaru’s headlights to read the notice in the dark. It said — in a polite and calm tone — that she would be moving back to Vermont this summer to renovate to the cabin. She would soon be mailing me a notice to vacate on or before May 1.

  I stood there, with that same feeling you get when you realize something you thought was real isn’t, like when you finally understand your love for someone is unrequited (I’m actually an expert on this) or that Santa doesn’t exist. That night, reading the letter, I finally understood that Cold Antler wasn’t real, either — it was always someone else’s.

  I understood that four months’ notice was generous, and ample time to pack up and move. I understood that a kind note sent to alert me of an eviction notice was courteous and friendly. My landlord was just doing what landlords do. I got that. I am not an irrational person.

  I wish I could say something about how the note was actually some kind of amazing affirmation of my own plans and dreams and that the universe was coming together to make my life happen as I’d visualized it. But honestly, I didn’t feel any of that. I was terrified. I. Was. Absolutely. Terrified. I felt as though I were sitting on a ticking time bomb and had no idea where I was going to end up, or how I was ever going to pull off getting my own farm. I’d always thought I would be the one sending a notice to my landlord. I thought this place would be mine for years, that I could live here until I was ready to move on to the next big thing and plan my life around that. But things had changed a lot since the holidays started.

  If it had only been a matter of moving myself and the dogs, it wouldn’t even be cause to blink. I’d done that before, when I was laid off from my job in Idaho. I had a new job and home lined up within a month, no sweat. But this was not just moving a girl and some huskies to an apartment in Bennington — this was trying to move an entire lifestyle. I had to find a place for me, a flock of sheep, a coop of birds, and two dogs in what amounted to only sixteen weeks. I needed to either get myself into a position to buy (and quick) or find another small plot of land that I could rent for another year while I saved. That second idea meant finding a landlord somewhere in the area who would welcome a small working farm. It wasn’t impossible, but it was unlikely. If I couldn’t buy a small place with a bit of land in time, I would have to find new homes for the remaining livestock and abandon the farm life for a while.

  THE SEARCH BEGINS

  APPARENTLY, I’M A SADIST, because even though I knew my credit score was a joke and my financial situation wouldn’t allow me to even come close to owning a farm, I still scoured real-estate listings and drove around Sandgate scouting FOR SALE signs. I wanted to stay in Vermont (very much so), so I tried to find places in-state that were in my price range. Sadly, everything in decent shape with enough room to accommodate my small farm was well over two hundred thousand dollars. Out of the question. As a single woman with a modest income and no life savings to crib from, buying a place with a monthly mortgage payment the size of a new living room set was as far-fetched as deciding to take up the biathlon for the Olympics. I needed to find a decent place, cheap, and fast.

  I expanded my search to within a thirty-mile radius of my office. It looked liked homes and land were cheaper just over the state line, in Washington County, New York. Online I came across a little white farmhouse with over six acres, totally redone, and all set for farming with a barn and pasture. It was more reasonable than anything for sale in Sandgate but still fifty thousand dollars more than I could justify buying. I sighed, closed the browser window, and went outside to walk the dogs. I’d rented a farm in Idaho. I made this place work for a while in Vermont. If I had to, I’d do it again. There must be a place for us somewhere. Someone had to need money badly enough to rent to a woman with a menagerie of chickens and ovines, right?

  The sad truth, though, was that I would probably have to find new homes for the poultry, the sheep, Finn, and the rabbits. I could find a dog-friendly apartment while I saved for my own farm. But it was crippling to think about how much time I would lose by taking a year off from the hoe and henhouse. A full season with chicks in the bathroom brooder or lettuce in the backyard was becoming as important to my living situation as indoor plumbing. I hated the idea of back-stepping like that, of missing the lessons and experience a year of gardens and livestock bestow on you. And I felt as though I had come so far: I finally had my flock. I had breeding Angoras, which were producing wonderful kits. I didn’t want to undo all that. No, an apartment was a last resort.

  In the meantime, word was spreading from Wayside that I was moving from the cabin, and those who were concerned about my situation had their ears to the ground. One freezing morning I was running late to the office, but my coffee addiction proved more powerful than my desire to be punctual. As I stepped inside the store, Nancy informed me that she knew of a place in town that might be available — a small cabin in East Sandgate that was owned by a family who had moved out West but still vacationed there from time to time. It had running water and electricity and was in decent shape, but it needed insulating and some serious winterizing if I was going to live there year-round. I got a lead for a contact, asked for the address, and decided to look into it. Rumor was holding steady that the old cabin was for sale, and in this economy an abandoned cabin might be exactly what I could afford. Nancy warned me that it was small, and only on one acre of land, but I could make that work for a few years or even longer if I had to. What I really wanted was some peace of mind, a place that was mine on paper. The only time I ever wanted to see paper nailed to my front door again was if I put it there myself.

  The following week I took a long lunch break with my friend Steve to see the cabin during daylight hours. We got a little turned around but eventually stumbled upon it. I thought it was beautiful: a tiny log cabin with a stone fireplace and a loft, set into the side of a mountain, with a winding staircase that led to the road right next to the Green River. The roof looked sound, the windows were intact, and as far as my untrained eye could ascertain, it looked like a solid house. Steve nodded in agreement. It wasn’t fancy, that was for sure, but it was cheap. Someone told me they were asking sixty to seventy-five thousand dollars for it and the land, and that was a mortgage I could afford. We drove back to work chatting and laughing. I was filled with hope and Steve was filled with the Italian grinder from Wayside he’d picked up for lunch. We’re both made happy fairly easily.

  The small cabin was starting to seem like the ideal solution. I had spoken with the neighbors about the property, and they seemed thrilled at the idea of sheep ruminating outside their windows. One potential neighbor had offered me the use of his barns and pastures in exchange for having my flock mow his lawn. Suddenly, my one acre was now next to a rentable pasture with more land than I knew what to do with. I got weak in the knees at the thought of starting my own lamb and wool operation right here in town, not to mention being able to sit with a banjo on the porch of my own cabin. It could be heaven.

  The family who owned the little cottage seemed genuinely wonderful. We talked for hours about my life, my goals for the place, the property, and my lifestyle. They explained the importance of the cabin to their family and how much nostalgia came with the land. They said they had named it the Foothold, since it was where they felt the most grounded in their lives. I was so touched I had to sit down. I explained about the livestock and bees, the gardens and dogs. I wanted them to understand that this
wouldn’t be a deer camp or a second home to be used only for ski vacations. I would do the place justice, make it my home. The matriarch of the family (who held the deed) seemed smitten with the idea of a young gardener with a good sense of the town taking the keys. Hoping to win them over, I sent postcards and a package, explained in letters how much I wanted to stay in Sandgate, and even collected a few letters of recommendation from the locals. My attempts were well received, but we never seemed to get to the nitty-gritty of deal making.

  Finally, one night I explained rather bluntly that I was out of a home in a few months and had a whole pack of farm animals that would be homeless, too. I didn’t have the means to secure a mortgage and was curious if they’d consider a rent-to-own option or holding the papers (meaning I would own the mortgage but they’d hold the deed until a certain amount of money had been paid). Both would secure me legal rights to the place without having to go through the agony of the housing process with banks and real-estate agencies. The family said they’d consider it after talking with their lawyer. I held my breath. I wanted the Foothold to work out.

  It didn’t.

  In the end, they simply wanted too much money and couldn’t cover the cost of making the camp into an all-season home. It was an odd situation to find myself in. Because they would not agree to owner financing or renting-to-own or anything else that might land me inside the heavy wooden doors, it meant I had to get approved for a mortgage. But no bank would approve a loan for a first-time homebuyer who was purchasing a shack without heat or insulation. Since I didn’t have the cash or a bank behind me to offer them the full price, I had to decline. They wanted cash on the barrelhead, and I had $586 in my savings account. So I lost my footing on the Foothold.

  Stress was high. With the fugitive animals in foster care — Finn had been picked up by a family in Bennington, the rabbits and goslings were staying with a family a few towns away — I could at least stop worrying about their welfare while I figured out my new address. But even with a few of the animals in farm purgatory, I still had twenty chickens, five hundred pounds of sheep, and two hairy dogs to move. Finding a rental was seeming less and less realistic. The ideal situation would be to buy a place. My own farm. And I was running out of time to figure out how.

  So I did what any clueless potential homebuyer does: I kept searching. I found a place online and called the number on the listing. It was a 1700s farmhouse with a woodstove and five acres — enough land to keep me busy for quite some time. The price was a little high, but in the housing market we were in, it seemed reasonable to offer less. I left a message explaining my situation, briefly, and the MLS listing number.

  A few days later a perky woman (suspiciously perky) called me back. She sounded thrilled at the idea of my owning a farm and wanted to help me out and asked me a hundred questions about my financial situation.

  “You make how much a year? You have how much saved? Your credit score is what?”

  None of my answers made her tone lighten. She calmly explained I would need a down payment of somewhere in the neighborhood of twelve thousand dollars for a home under a hundred and fifty thousand. That was a crippling amount of money to me — almost a third of my salary. To make it appear overnight would be impossible.

  I realized that if I was ever going to have my own farm, I needed to start squirreling away money. I started saving. I didn’t buy coffee at Wayside. I ate spaghetti for dinner for weeks. I sold my banjo (again), some artwork, antiques, and music online, and ended up a month later with two thousand dollars in my new savings account, barely enough to cover a home inspection, a good-faith deposit, and a moving van. Things were starting to look hopeless. I worried that I’d be posting on Craigslist soon, giving away chickens, geese, and sheep to good homes. I didn’t sleep well.

  Then one day everything changed. The price of a property in Washington County dropped by more than fifty-thousand dollars. It was in a town called Jackson, just over the state line in New York. It had everything: a white farmhouse, a pasture, a barn, a chicken coop, an artesian well, a stream, and a pond on six and a half acres. I did some math and realized I could afford the mortgage for roughly the same cost as my old rent and car payment on the Subaru (which I had just paid off). This could, just maybe, be mine.

  I called the agent and asked if I could see it. He said of course and that the sellers were highly motivated. A retired couple had restored the place over the past four years but now wanted to move south and be with their family. He explained that the heating system, well, insulation, electric — everything — had been redone. The house was in amazing shape, but it was hard to find the right buyer. It was small (roughly eleven hundred square feet) and had warped floors and low ceilings. It had only two bedrooms and one small bathroom downstairs. It was built around the time of the Civil War and still had the old tree-trunk rafters in the attic. It sounded wonderful. And to a girl living in a shack, it was a mansion.

  I drove to see it the following weekend. Leon, the agent, walked me around the property and told me, almost apologetically, that he wished it was summer so I could see the place in its full glory. But I could easily imagine the trees flush with leaves and picture the giant maple in the front lawn bursting red with fall foliage. It was remarkable. Inside the small house, things were quaint, albeit a little wonky. The floor was old and uneven, the rafters in the living room were exposed (which I loved), and the weird cave of basements and the attics and mudrooms behind the house seemed cobbled together almost as an afterthought. It was funky, sure, but it had character.

  I told Leon I loved it, wanted to know what to do next. I explained my limited savings but decent employment history and a perfect rental record. He told me to talk to his mortgage broker, Jim, who knew a lot about financing homes in Washington County through, of all places, the USDA. Leon explained that the Rural Housing Development Program let single-family homebuyers get a property with no money down (my ears pricked) and still qualified me for all the first-time homebuyer incentives the government was pimping to resuscitate the market (ears fully pricked). After the tour, and that talk, the idea of actually owning the small farm trotted from the world of fat chance into the realm of possibility. Could there be a perfect storm of luck, a recession, no-money-down farm loans, and desperate sellers? Perhaps.

  After the first couple of “near purchases,” I told myself that I should know better than to get emotionally invested in this house. I should be solid steel during meetings with the agent. I should care about it as much as I care about the filing cabinet in the office. Poker face. Stiff upper lip. Walk away like a champ. But getting emotionally invested in my lifestyle was what had gotten me where I was. It was what had driven me to move cross-country (twice), start a renter’s homestead, write a blog, author books, and try to change my patterns of consumption. So really, I’d been attached to the house before I knew it existed, before I saw it. It was the embodiment of a life I craved deeply. I was sure my claw marks were already on the deed.

  I wanted to go home. I wanted it so much, my ribs rattled.

  Then I found out another person was being shown the farmhouse. Hearing that was an unexpected punch in the kidneys. I had already made my offer and the owners had countered. We eventually came to an agreement that made them happy and cost me only fifteen dollars more a month. I wasn’t out of the woods yet, though. The other people could still beat my offer. And I still needed to be approved for a mortgage, which was the razor’s edge of this whole thing. Since I had dedicated myself to fixing my credit, I’d raised it twenty points, but it was still twenty points below what the lenders wanted. If they decided against me, I’d be out the dream. And I hated the thought of the property going to people who wouldn’t use the land.

  It was ridiculously stressful. I knew in my logical mind that there were other homes out there, and I am one of those people who believe that everything happens for a reason … but to lose out on this place, at this price, near my work, with the threat of eviction hanging over m
y head, would be too much.

  GOING HOME

  THE ANIMALS WERE NOT CONCERNED. As I was being emotionally accosted by the stress of my pending eviction while trying to pull off a Hail Mary mortgage, farm life continued as it always had. The chickens kept laying eggs and pooping on the porch. The dogs slept and played as usual. My three sheep (Sal and Maude remained, but I’d returned Marvin to his previous owners, at their request, because they missed him; I had replaced him with a little black lamb I named Joseph) were as normal as rain. They ate, baaed, and shuffled around their pen and small pasture as always. There was some comfort in their apathy; I interpreted it to be confidence that all would be well. It was delusional, of course. I knew their lack of anxiety had to do with the comfort of their routines and not their faith in me. But routines also brought me comfort. Feeding buckets of grain, refilling water fonts, buying a few bales of hay from Nelson … it was normal work. And no matter how much my life swirled around the possibilities of locations, that work stayed the same. I cherished this.

  I was e-mailing my mortgage broker every day, trying to get some sort of update on the possibility of qualifying for the note. I had compiled all the paperwork, paid off my credit cards, and boosted my savings as much as possible; but none of this mattered if I couldn’t get my credit score up to the magical number the bank wanted. I checked my score constantly online and prayed that the fifty-point jump I needed would occur. Because scores take awhile to reflect the paid-off bills, my broker wanted me to wait until the last possible minute to officially apply. It was like waking up and walking on glass every day.