A Friendly Face on the Road

Sunset behind The Little House yesterday

There’s a feeling I get on Sunday evenings. It’s a sort of lonely feeling that occurs after I realize that we’re just hours away from a set routine again.

When the alarm goes off on Monday morning, my husband will be gone for most of the waking hours of the week and I’ll be here working and keeping the home fires burning (literally, if it is cold outside) with just the dogs for company.

Yesterday evening felt particularly lonely as we also had to say goodbye to our good friends and neighbors down the road. They’ve become our second family down here.

They still live in Kansas City full time and usually commute down here every other week. However, they have a full family social calendar this fall and will not be back until sometime in December.

We had a really good time meeting their son and daughter-in-law this past weekend and sharing a meal with them on Saturday night. Their home overlooks the lake and provides spectacular views at sunset.

Late yesterday afternoon, Dale and I took the dogs for an off leash romp toward their end of the road, where vacant vacation homes stand overlooking the vast blue waters of Bull Shoals Lake, and met our friends as they were pulling out of their drive. Theirs is the last occupied house at that end and once we pass their driveway, it is very secluded.

Another friend of mine down here has called this area “the loneliest place on earth,” and sometimes it feels that way, particularly when we’re saying goodbye to our dear neighbors, knowing we won’t see them for well over a month.

After bidding them and their dogs a good trip, we continued walking that tree-canopied part of the road, down toward the point, passing the ruins of a long ago burned out house, the sound of leaves crunching under our feet the only thing we could hear.

Maybe it’s looking out onto the water, which extends for miles beyond our cove, maybe it’s the creepy foundation and brick fireplace left standing in those ruins, or just maybe it’s that part of the road reminds me a little of a scene from “The Legends of Sleepy Hollow” book I had as a child.

When we’re at that end of the road, it’s easy to imagine we’re the only people on earth.

Most of the time the seclusion of The Little House is comforting, offering quiet and the freedom from noisy neighbors, sales people and other disruptions found in the city.

However, there’s times like last night when it is just too quiet.

On our way back from our walk yesterday evening, we heard a 4-wheeler approaching. Dale and I looked at each other questioningly and affirming that it was actually someone driving down the road, we each grabbed one of the small dogs and put them on their leashes.

It was a neighbor and his wife from around the bend enjoying an early evening ride on a beautiful Indian Summer Day.

We greeted them, talked about the nice weather and how lucky we were to be in it, and to be here, and my lonely feeling that my mother used to call the “let down,” subsided.

Sometimes you just need to meet a friendly face on the road to put you back on track and make you realize that you’re never really all alone.

Are there times when you feel all alone? What do you do about it?