Resort Living!
"Ah, you guys live the good life," she sighed as she leaned back in her chair yesterday.

'She' was a guest from Bozeman who visits regularly - and 'she' did and didn't represent the norm. She didn't represent the norm for women - most of whom think I've lost my mind when I say I 'love' living in the middle of nowhere. A visit they love. To stay? No, thank you. However, she did represent the norm for the majority of our guests - primarily the men and youth.

I must admit, depending on the day of course, most of the time I would agree with her wholeheartedly. Take last night. After a couple hours of heavy (well, for this winter at least) snow, a calm, quiet night slowly descended upon us. In spite of the cold (it was quickly approaching zero outside), I opened the upstairs slider and stuck my head out - just to listen.

The only sound was the faint shushing of the trees across the lake. Otherwise. . . How does one describe stillness? A quiet so deep you can feel it?

Some people are accutely uncomfortable with this much quiet. Take much of our current youth culture. Even in a crowded mall with lots of noise or in the presence of their friends, I notice many of them wandering around with earplugs piping 'music' to their brains at all hours of the day and night. I guess my craving for 'quiet' is as alien to them as their craving for constant noise is to me.

On the other hand, there was the middle of the day yesterday with its roar of snowmobiles, the clanking of crashing of pots and pants and silverware from the kitchen, and the laughter and rumble of conversation from the dining room. The press of guests makes up the greater part of my day (particularly in the summer) and, like everything else, although I enjoy it for the most part, there are times when I wish I could just lock the door and keep the world out.

Take last weekend. We were all under the weather due to a visiting virus. Everyone was either in bed sleeping off their bug or laying around (in their PJ's with sleep squished hair and pillow creased faces) on the couch watching TV. In roared a bunch of snowmobiles. Now, we're closed on Sunday so they didn't ask to come in, but sometimes it feels like an invasion of our privacy to have a half a dozen people eating their sack lunches on our deck while we huddle out of sight in our living room.

I guess it's just like everything else - we get to take the good with the 'bad'. However, I must admit, for the privilege of living here - I'll be glad to take a lot of the 'bad'!

Lady of the Lake