Mending Fences

Hi Ya’ll! Welcome back to Justamere Farm! I tried to sit down last week and write a post that I’d been drafting in my head, but I just didn’t find the time. So many activities last week & then there was Mother’s Day. So, before we head out on a MUCH needed vacation, I thought I’d put pen to paper (or more like fingers to keys) & get this out of my brain.

A little back story to set the stage...in 1972 Landon’s father (Zenovy) & mother (Gail) bought two 5-acre parcels in the small farming community of Elk Grove, CA. Zenovy, engineered & built a 3-bedroom home on one of the parcels which is where Landon called home for the first 11 yrs of his life. In the early 1980’s, Zen started to build another home on the 2nd parcel, which was to be Gail’s dream home. Unfortunately, midway through the 80’s, Landon’s parents divorced & Zen stopped all building on the 2nd parcel, leaving what he had built, a garage & the raised foundation of the perimeter of the house, as well as had a well drilled, a septic tank & power installed to the foundation. Landon moved to another home in Elk Grove with his mom & brother while Zen stayed in the house he’d built on the 1st parcel.

Fast forward to 2010 when Landon & I approached Zen to ask if he’d allow us to build a home on the 2nd parcel of land. He said no because he didn’t want to pay the additional property taxes that would be assessed when a house was built, even though we offered to pay him rent for the land & all expenses, including the property taxes, for the house. The answer was still no so Landon & I shelved our dream for a couple of years & within these last 3 years decided that we’d just buy a piece of property ourselves, with a house, pool & barn already built. We searched & searched but never found quite what we were looking for.

In 2019, Landon started making his own wine, which by the way is AMAZING…even winning awards at local competitions. We approached Zen to ask if we could plant wine grapes out at the 2nd parcel, to which Zen agreed. SWEET RIGHT?!? After the 2019 “wine crush” season in September, my father became ill with an acute case of pneumonia & passed away shortly thereafter. That is when life went topsy-turvy! In late 2020, after finally recovering from all things related to my dad’s estate, we started to breathe again, but was short lived. In early January 2021, Landon’s mother, Gail, passed away VERY suddenly from what we believe was a stroke. Our whole world started spinning…like Dorothy in the tornado from the “Wizard of Oz.” Just as the winds started to dwindle in early March, another tornado came out of nowhere (as they usually do), this time in the death of Landon’s stepfather, Chuck, who also died VERY suddenly of what we believed was a broken heart. We definitely weren’t in Kansas anymore!!!

By August 2021 we had laid 1 of my parents to rest & 2 of Landon’s parents to rest. We had settled all estate matters & were ready to move out of the storms path. On 9/14/2021, Landon & I celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary in Turks & Caicos with a renewal of vows. It felt as though to some extent we were starting all over again in so many aspects of our lives & we felt as though whatever tornado/hurricane/cyclone we’d been in the last year & a half had finally passed, we could breathe again. In October I had convinced Zen to allow us to raise chickens out on the 2nd parcel come Spring of 2022, but little did we know that a new storm had been brewing. Just after Thanksgiving we came home from a quick trip to Southern California to find Zen in the hospital. Apparently, Zen had been suffering from abdominal pain for quite some time but was afraid to go to the doctor. When the pain was intolerable, Zen drove himself to the VA hospital to seek emergency care & by 4pm the next day we received the grim news that he had stage 4 pancreatic cancer. Doctors gave him a few months to live. We were thrust into making difficult decisions instantly. We made the decision to bring Zen to our home to begin hospice care as soon as he was stable enough to move. On 12/14/2021, just after the nurses prepared Zen to be transported to our home, he died peacefully in his sleep as he awaited the ambulance’s arrival. BAM! The wind was sucked out of us yet again! Zen was cremated a few days later & we decided to wait till after the holidays to make any further decisions about anything else (funeral/memorial, estate, etc). We needed time to think. To summarize…Landon lost all of his parents in 2021. Can you imagine that? I lost my dad & that was hard enough to cope with but to lose all your parents in just one year…completely & utterly unfathomable. When we married, between the two of us we had 6 parents & in the last 18 months we lost 4 of those 6. There are no words that I can write to describe the level of heart break we’ve been experiencing & to be honest, we haven’t even fully grieved each of the deaths because it all happened so fast.

SO…you’re probably wondering how all this correlates to my blog title, “Mending Fences.” Sorry for the long back history, but it was necessary to get to the point. Landon inherited the 2nd parcel of land after Zen’s death. This land is now known as Justamere Farm & Winery, the land we are trying to cultivate our dreams on (yay! full circle now…). With the rain finally passing, we are now able to start the process of clearing the property & in doing so, the first thing we needed to tackle was the weeds & fences. 3 of the 4 fence sides were well maintained by neighbors already, but to secure the property we needed to mend the front fence (straighten bent poles & tighten the mesh wire fence along the poles, plus add a gate). In doing so Landon said, “I guess I should get used to mending fences since this will be a recurring theme in our desire to start a farm & winery.” AND…as any property owner or farmer will attest, it’s an ongoing struggle. As Landon’s words rattled around in my head, I started thinking about the fences around our hearts that need mending too. I didn’t have the best relationship with my father & just a month before his death, we had both realized that it was time to start the healing process between father/daughter after 44 yrs of a tumultuous relationship. I contemplate how life would look if we had the opportunity to mend the fence between us; how would our relationship be now?

To say that our relationship with Chuck & Gail was perfect would be untruthful. We had a close relationship through the first 16 years of our married lives together, but after they moved to Southern California in 2016, the relationship was strained for many reasons. Ultimately, Landon & I struggled to understand why they would want to be so far away from their kids & grandkids when they always spoke about family being first. The last Christmas they visited (2019), they decided to move back up to Northern California to be closer to us so we could help provide them with anything as they aged; & they promised our kids they’d attend more of their performances & go camping more frequently with us, especially after we'd just bought a new RV. They needed to finish the upgrading they’d started on their home so they could sell it & have a good-sized down payment for a house up here. The fences were starting to get mended, but they both died before we could solidify an actual move, or even go camping together in our new RV.

And Landon’s relationship with his dad Zen…well, gosh, I don’t even know how to describe it. After his parent’s divorce, Zen barely saw the boys (Landon & his brother); maybe 2 or 3 times a year or special occasions, like high school/college graduation. We had to BEG him to come to our wedding & even wear a tuxedo. When our kids were born Zen made a point of stopping by to see them every 3 months or so, even though he lived just 5 minutes away (Zen was a hermit & didn’t like people too much). So, when Zen passed away, Landon realized he didn’t know his dad at all. He knew the basics, where he was born, where he went to school, that he served in the military, what his occupation was & that he loved to discuss politics & religion, well I should say “debate” politics & religion because every discussion turned into a debate. But through the funeral planning process, the cleaning up of his estate & properties, we are getting glimpses into the man he was & we’re left wishing we’d had more time to mend the broken fences in our relationship with him too.

You see, as we are literally & physically mending fences on our farm/winery, we are figuratively mending fences in our hearts. The grieving process is different for everyone & I wish there was some wise piece of advice I could give anyone reading this, but the only advice I have is very cliché…Time is fleeting. You never know when you will say your last goodbye, or have your last laugh, hug, or be able kiss those that you love. Don’t wait to start mending the broken fences/relationships in your lives. It maybe hard to forget some things, but it is easy to forgive.

“Mend Fences; Build Bridges; Forgive Trespasses; Grieve Losses and let toxic grudges go.Then move on.” Unichija Tamano

Tomorrow (5/13) we will lay Zen's ashes in their final resting place & Saturday (5/14), we will celebrate his life with family & friends...