A Whimsical Adventure - Periwinkle Poetry
Allison Pennington - Wintertide
TLP Collab - Home, Community, World
Journaling reads:
1993 - current
12444 N Rockton Avenue, Rockton, Illinois - We began looking for our new home in the spring of 1993. We hired our accountant who just recently acquired a realtor's license. He took us to various houses that were just not the right fit. Surprisingly, we found our home, for sale by owner, just by looking at the ads in the paper. Christine, the owner, was single and lived there alone. She was going back to school and did not have enough time for the upkeep. The home sat on a lovely 2 1/2 acres. John grew up 1 1/2 miles away. He recalled it when it was a cow pasture. With a creek running through it, much of the old trees were not touched when the home was built in 1986. Beautiful old shag bark hickories and stately 200+ year old burr oaks graced the property.
I had my reservations. The creek side of the property bordered a state highway. Granted, the highway is only 41.64 miles in length and it is two lanes, one in either direction, but trucks and fast-moving cars an everyday occurrence. While the home was designed by Christine, fashioned with a salt-box style in mind, her father was the contractor and a number of less expensive items were used. The central vacuum was an old model, not able to be purchased new, even in those days. The water tank was the size for a cabin, not for a home with two floors plus a basement and 2 full baths. Aside from inexpensive linoleum in the kitchen, bathrooms and entryway, wall-to-wall carpeting existed. And unlike our previous home, once we ripped out the carpeting, we were left with a subflooring...
But it was close to John’s family. That was a selling point. We lived outside of the village limits, in the county. It was peaceful and calm with natural beauty surrounding us. We worked hard to supplement the existing wonderful trees with 1000+ seedlings that we planted over the years. Some came as transplants from our previous home on Enterprise, some came from the local nurseries, but many we purchased through the Winnebago County Conservation District with their yearly tree sale. It wasn’t uncommon for us to plant 200+ trees in a season. We worked much harder on the property outside with the intent to bring it back to nature than we did on the structurally sound and new inside. And so today we are blessed with a stunning looking property, so much hard work to look like a wild, natural place.
Over the years we have continued to stain the cedar siding with the original red-brown stain. We replaced the roof when it was necessary with a lovely green shingled one, and it fits the home so well. A number of years ago, we put in a Vermont Castings free-standing fireplace. It sits centrally located, in the middle of our great room. Because of us aging, we put in a leaf guard system, no more ladder climbing twice a year to clean out those gutters. And the last major home purchase was an all-house generator so that when the power would go out, we were protected with the gas generator that took over.
Sadly, John passed away on April 5, 2023. And now I am left in this rustic home in a gorgeous setting all by myself. In the first 10 days of his death, people were being unknowingly hurtful and asking me where I was going to live. This is our home, and yes, it is now my home. I have worked side-by-side with John to make our dreams a reality. And for the immediate future and beyond, I plan on continuing our vision together.
