Wicomicoville’s Weblog

…or how I escaped the D.C. suburbs to life in a bewildering village on Maryland’s Eastern Shore (think Green Acres).

We (my husband, my dog, and I) moved to Wicomico County two and a half years ago from a wonky community inside the Beltway.  Our plan?  Fix up an old farm house and start a vegetable garden.  We’re about 3/4 of the way done with the house but have run out of funds so it will stay this way for a while.  It’s livable.  The contractors we’ve worked with have been, to varying degrees, incompetent  and/or dishonestand from what I’ve been told by other “come heres” (those of us who have moved to the Eastern Shore from elsewhere) this is to be expected.  More about the house and the Eastern Shore work ethic another time.

We’re still experiencing culture shock two years into our project.  Our neighbors have mostly been kind and helpful beyond our expectations, especially in contrast to our inside-the-beltway community where I hardly knew a soul in our neighborhood even after 15 years.  Unfortunately our new neighbors also do things like burn tires and keep their dogs on chains – things that would never be tolerated in our old neighborhood.  More about the neighbors and village life at another date.

The garden has, alas, been delayed by the ongoing house snafus but I’m optimistic about next year’s prospects.  We’re going to try our hardest to be organic about it.  In the mean time I’ve been planting a hedgerow of native shrubs.  And we’re trying to be as green as we can afford to be; we’ve installed a geothermal HVAC system and have a special type of septic tank that reduces nitrogen run off into the Chesapeake Bay.  The State of Maryland has been very supportive of our efforts, providing a grant for the geothermal system and replacing our circa 1947 septic tank for free (although we provided the drainfield to the tune of several thousand dollars).  I love Maryland for so many reasons, and the state keeps making it easier for me to love it.

On the whole we’re satisfied that we’ve done the right thing by leaving the D.C. area – I don’t mind too much that the nearest Trader Joe’s or Whole Foods are in Annapolis (two hours away) when I look up into the night sky and am struck senseless by the broad sweep of the Milky Way.  At our old house all I could make out was Orion and the Big Dipper.  And hearing Screech Owls at night trumps sirens screaming on the Beltway any time.  More about nature later.

Our experiences in our little corner of Wicomico County, which I’ll call Wicomicoville, have been heartwarming, infuriating, confusing, funny, exhilarating, and exhausting.  And I don’t think we’ve ever been happier.