by Jules Roberts

Created on: November 01, 2008

I remember laughing at her as she stood surrounded by broken wooden crate boxes; "You're kidding me, right?". And her standing there, the picture of seriousness; "No, I'm not kidding". And so her new project started.

I mean, its not that I don't want to be supportive - but turning wooden crate boxes into houses? Most people just throw them away. Then she tells me that's the beauty of it, turning rubbish into homes for free. She starts showing me bits of paper with pencilled diagrams and I turn away; "You know me better than that - show me it finished".

And so a few weeks later I dropped down to her workshop again. Bits of wood and tools lay about all over the place, and one wall was stacked with these wooden crates. I smile again; "We'll have to celebrate when you get your first house up".

She drops her tools and turns around, slightly annoyed; "Whatever, I've picked the location anyhow". So I listen to the wheres and whys of the location where this project will start. Perhaps a bit too enthusiastically, as the next thing I know we're in the car heading for the destination...

... the rain is lashing down on the car and washing the windscreen faster than the wipers can move. There's something satisfying about the rhythm of the rain beating down on the car though. At least until she said; "This is it". She gets out of the car impatiently; "come on". I look on after her, very glad now that my jacket has a hood. I put up my hood and zip my jacket closed in no hurry whatsoever.

Outside the car the wind is picking up and I trample after her, sometimes sliding in the wet mud. How does she never slip down? She walks as easily on mud as on floor tiles. My clumsy feet behave as if they are walking down a sheet of ice. I'm cold and the wind is making me catch my breath, she's always in such a hurry!

At last she has stopped and I drag my now drenched body onto a picnic bench and sit down. The rainfall is slowed by the trees in this forest. I look around. Big tall trees surround me. I am splashed with mud up to my knees. She starts talking to me about the trees here. My mind wanders, the trees here all look pretty alike to me. Her chatter sounds as enthusiastic and as rhythmic as the rain and I allow the two to blend into one familiar and soothing noise. I breathe in the smells of nature, so different from the city I work in, and wonder how come mud smells so clean?

Soon we are back in the car and headed home. Two months later, she puts up her first wooden house in the forest

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