In the beginning.....

She was just a shed. 48 hours later she takes slow learning-how-to-breaths. Her old skin, the one riddled with hooks and nails and plywood shelves has been peeled away, tossed in a giant heatwave to the side

An army came. The tiniest little feel-good soldier 4 years old, digging, painting, sweating. The oldest, 73, hauling, carrying, digging in the dirt and digging in his pockets. We had hippies and hippies, redneck loves, 3 piece suits in blue jeans, a nursing Mom, three generations of Chey's family. We had wayward sons, daughters home from college, neighbors, and friends from the bar. And they never stopped.

I watched for a moment, an orchestra in the Saturday heat:

One on a ladder pulling wires, hanging boxes...

two toting drywall again and again, another piece, appearing from nowhere,

One pouring concrete,

One hanging a door,

Three digging ditches,

Two cutting out new doorways and window spaces,

One right behind them framing.

Two on the barbeque grill.....jerk chicken juice mixing with sawdust in the wind....

Night came hard and fast. Just like the beer. At dusk we partied and told stories and the sweat turned to sweet dust, powdering our skin. We wrote in the concrete. Because we could. The children colored there. Because we let them.

And we all watched. The little shed slowly coming to life.

"You should name her" Eric said....."Gimme Peace".....and I smiled. This morning with my coffee, I sat on the deck and she smiled back at me through her new window to the world. Her walls are insulated and her cieling hung. 12 sheets of drywall are up, only 4 left to go. Her new doorway is waiting on visitors to knock and her old doorway, waiting for it's new face. Outlets are ready for Christmas trees and microwaves. Water is just inches away.

On Monday, Ronnie starts his next round of treatments. The pink stuff. The bad stuff. Hopefully the good stuff here will make it all a little better. And he'll have a place to hang his cowboy hat.

Thanks to all you all for cheering, clinking, sending good thoughts our way. We're tired soldiers today.....