Retiring to the Woods
I will be retiring at the end of the month and am so excited to enter the next phase of my life. Retiring to the woods has long been a dream of mine. I’ve worked almost non-stop since the age of 14. I’ve had a couple of careers in my life. I started as a US Air Force officer and ended up as a computer programmer working in space and missile systems. Along the way, I’ve made many friends and had a lot of fun.
But despite working in technology for most of my life, I’ve always wanted to live a more rural life by retiring to the woods. As a child, I spent much of my time in the woods and swamps of southwest Louisiana.
Two years ago, my husband Barry and I bought 75 acres in Southwest Louisiana. Crowded young trees, mostly consisting of Loblolly pines, fill the property. Past clear-cut logging left the land with over-crowded young trees. This severe overcrowding of the clear-cut land restricts the amount of wildlife in the property. Eventually we will change this by adding trails, a meadow or small pasture and maybe a pond.
We now have deer, turkeys, and songbirds appearing because of the small amounts of land clearing. Perhaps in the future we will have quail and more deer. We also need to thin out the trees from in front of where the house will be built. Our land is just a few miles where my mother grew up. More family live about 25 miles away from our land. My family has lived in the area for the last two hundred years.
We cleared out 3-4 acres by bulldozing it to clear out the young trees and burning the stumps. Then we moved in an old 3-bedroom mobile home and set up the electric service and septic system. We got lots of help from my husband’s brother Tommy. Over the last year, Barry contracted out and had a nice 30’x40′ metal building with an overhanging porch set up on the south side of the building. Now, we are ready to build a house on the land. It is so exciting and I hope to document the progress on this site.
Future plans for the cleared land include a small orchard and a large garden. This will be interesting, with our goal of increasing the wildlife on our land. We will just have to rodent and deer proof the garden and fruit trees. Once we move onto the property in the future and the house pad and slab are done, I plan to layout the location where the garden and orchard are located. I also have more time for my various hobbies like ceramics, stained glass, and fiber arts like weaving and spinning. I’m so excited to start.