For years, my husband wanted to live up in the crisp, cool, clean mountains (I was a die-hard city girl) and when our rental house in Sacramento was suddenly being sold and we were put in a position of having to buy a house, I did what I do when we need another car.  I rally up Eric, wave my hand in the general direction of "out there" and give him the "fetch" command... "Go get me a ______."  (You can fill in house, car, Snicker's Bar, whatever)  He has only let me down once and that was when he brought home a white car, which just will not do.  Overall, his track record is absolutely unbeatable, so I felt totally confident when I said, "Honey, go find me a house."  On the metro list, we kept getting drawn back to this area (which we'd never heard of before), so he decided to make arrangements to check out a few places up here while I patiently sat home twiddling my thumbs and waiting to hear his assessment. 

ABOUT SIX HOURS LATER he finally called to let me know he'd found our new home and ask me if I was sure I was good with him making an offer.  I hold him he knew if it was home or not and I trusted his instinct, so he called and started the process of purchasing the place on the way home.  When he got back (and this is up to debate since evidently he and I had two totally different conversations), I heard him say to me, "Honey, it's so beautiful up there.  You're going to love it.  It's about 30 minutes or so from Sacramento.  I talked to the neighbors and it barely snows at all and the house is perfect."  Obviously, he was telling me it was 30 minutes from some place that was 30 minutes from Sacramento and I missed that minor piece.  The whole snow thing just shows what a buncha effin liars my neighbors are.  (Just kidding, I love'em)

So in March of 2004, less than a month after he first came up to see the place, they strapped my rocking chair to the top of the truck and hauled me up the mountain, kicking and screaming.  When we got just past Diamond Springs, I started saying, "Well, I guess it's around here some place close.  This isn't too bad, there's even a town."  We kept driving.  He was in the U-Haul in front of me and I was in the big ol' Caprice behind him with a couple of kids and a really angry cat who was loudly yelling "MEYOW" every 3 seconds on the nose for 90 minutes without missing a beat. 

I saw "Grizzly Flat Road" and thought "I'm almost home!"  (Easily another 20 minutes left to go).  Finally, we got there (by then, I was pretty sure we were in Nevada) and I instantly knew I was home.  When I drove up to the house behind the moving van, it was the first time I ever saw the place in person.  It was perfect.  That sense of gratitude and joy I felt when I first saw the place is still here, almost 3 years later.  I love it.  Rain or shine, snow or sun.   Yes, I got quite a surprise when the snow came.  Yes, I got horribly car sick the first year or so, every single time I went up or down the mountain.  I still do sometimes, depending on what vehicle I'm in.  Yes, I got INTO my house and realized why Eric had not taken photos of the kitchen.  It's the size of a postage stamp.  What???  No dishwasher?

I still don't care.  I love it here and can't imagine living anywhere else.

(Boy is Eric relieved - that really could have gone badly for him)

That day, my incredible appreciation of Grizzly Flats began and I have to tell you, in the words of Minnie Pearl, "I'm just s'happy to be here."