Every morning, the same question. What does my dream home look like?

Two answers. Always two.

Mountain

A wooden cabin. High up. Weathered cedar. Windows like picture frames.

Silence has weight here. Real silence. Not the fake quiet of headphones. The deep hush where thoughts settle like snow.

Morning mist. Pine needles. Coffee that tastes sharper at altitude. Air that carries stories—woodsmoke, spruce breath, ancient snow.

No notifications. No neighbors. No schedule but sunrise and sunset.

Just you. Stone and sky. The vast indifference that somehow feels like the deepest acceptance.

But isolation cuts both ways.

Village

A small cottage. Cobblestone streets. No cars allowed. Garden gate opening onto curves and conversations.

The coffee shop knows your name. Your Tuesday mood. The bakery fills morning air with warm bread promises. The library catches afternoon light in tall windows. Dust motes dancing like tiny spirits.

Art studios cluster like flowers. Pottery wheels spinning stories into clay. Easels holding half-finished dreams. The sound of creativity becomes the town’s heartbeat.

Everything within walking distance. Not just survival needs. Soul needs. Beauty and bread. Solitude and connection.

The Swing

Day after day, I pendulum between these visions. Mountain and valley. Alone and together.

Some mornings crave the mountain’s stark honesty. The way it strips everything nonessential. The cabin becomes a monastery. Prayer is presence. Practice is paying attention.

Other days hunger for the village’s warm complexity. Small interactions weaving meaning into ordinary moments. The baker’s smile. The librarian’s recommendation. The artist next door humming while she works.

Tiny threads. Woven together. Something larger than solitude ever could be.

What Home Means

Home isn’t location. It’s alignment.

The cabin represents authentic self-encounter. That vital space where we meet ourselves without masks. The village embodies belonging. The gentle friction of human connection that polishes us like stones in a stream.

We dream these places because we sense what our current lives lack. The cabin promises depth. The village promises warmth. Both offer something rare: the chance to live deliberately.

Neither vision requires a mortgage. Neither demands a five-year plan. Both simply ask that we pay attention to what we need. And have courage to move toward it.

Somewhere between mountain and village, between alone and together, between who we are in solitude and who we become in community—we find not just a house.

We find a way of being in the world.