Anthony in Loretto

Here is my thank you letter to Simon and Jean-Marc: Dear Jean-Marc and Simon, Vivien and I found our home quite unexpectedly. An unfortunate circumstance provided us the opportunity to visit real-estate properties. From the time we set our feet upon the earth around our place we felt a call — an invitation to explore further. We felt it at that time, but didn’t understand. It was just a piece of land with a house on it. How could there be anything spiritual or soulful drawing us in? We decided to acquire the property and although the convolutions of life ebbs and flows one’s spirits, we have always felt anchored and at peace here. We felt something else though. It is impossible to express with one or two words what the energy was that we felt around us. There was a sense of harmony between us and the environment, but on the other hand there was a feel of burgeoning unsettlement. We felt a need from around us for something — but what? I felt that construction of our home in this conservation area destroyed significant habitat and had left a very unstable landscape. Many mature trees were in slow decline, we noticed fewer fauna around the property, and neighbours were constructing on their properties with even less regard for these issues. Somewhat by coincidence we found your company. We liked your ideas of landscaping with minimal ecologic impact. Your expertise in this area gave us confidence in your ideas. We hired you to design and build a landscape around our house that would restore some of what was destroyed. It was the least we could do, we thought, and yet the work would likely not restore the ecology to the nature of what had been here. This project turned into a massive undertaking fraught with obstacles of every type. But I have found this to be true of anything worthwhile in life. The value of a thing is only understood by the difficulty to achieve it. And now it is done. The professionalism of you and your crew helped to carry us through one event after another and in more ways than one you facilitated a successful completion of the project. You carried our stresses on your shoulders so that we wouldn’t have to. Although the project demanded more of you and your resources than any of us expected, I know that your creations here will forever contain some of your spirit. Vivien and I will do everything within our power as long as we live here to keep that spirit resonating. From the natural pool that you created, frogs sing. From the Birches in the back that replace those wise ones lost, I hear the wind sigh happily. From the Sumacs and Dogwoods in the front, and the ferns in between, sits a single turtle looking out to the road. He is at peace. So are we all. We are home again and it is far beyond any home our dreams could have conjured. Thank you for recapturing the spirit of our place.