Typically beautiful.

I’m always up before sunrise in the winter and I usually only have a vague idea of what the sky is like outside until it gets light enough to see. In the winter months, this area is prone to fog that usually forms over the Columbia River and drifts through the valley. Sometimes it builds enough to completely envelope me at The Aerie, which is about 700 feet above the river’s elevation, surrounding me with a damp white cloud. Other times, it fills the valley below me, making me feel as if the few homes I can see are the only ones on earth.

While December isn’t nearly as foggy as January can be, we’ve been having more than the average number of foggy mornings — and days — lately. This morning is one of them.

As I took my first look outside this morning, I suddenly recalled a morning about a year ago. I’d been living in my RV, the “mobile mansion,” in my big RV garage, waiting to continue work on my home upstairs. For some reason, I decided to go upstairs and take a look out at the view. It was cold in the garage — probably in the 30s — and it wasn’t much warmer upstairs, which was completely open to the RV garage and uninsulated. The walls were no more than framed skeletons of what would be fleshed out later with drywall, the floor was still dusty plywood. I went down what would be my hallway into what would be my bedroom. I opened the door to the non-existent deck and looked out.

And I saw something remarkably like what I saw this morning.

Not a very good photo of what’s outside this morning — my iPhone doesn’t handle low-light situations very well. But you get the idea. Wenatchee is somewhere in the middle of this shot, under the cloud.

Later, if the sun breaks through the higher clouds — which is unlikely today based on the forecast of a “wintery mix” all day — various parts of the view will glow in the sunlight. I have photos like that, too.

Anyway, last year, when I looked out at this view, I tried to imagine what it would be like to roll out of bed and see this from my bedroom window. My imagination just couldn’t do the job. Living here, having this ever-changing vista part of my daily life, is something that simply can’t be imagined. I feel so amazingly fortunate to have found this place and rebuilt my life here.

Not long after that December morning, I moved forward with my project. I had my HVAC system installed. I got to work on the wiring. I hired plumbers. I contracted with the insulation/drywall/painting guys to put my walls in. I bought plumbing fixtures. I laid tile in the bathroom and Pergo throughout the rest of the space. I did the job of a general contractor to get my home built. You can read the details in my numerous new home construction posts.

Now my home is just about done. My deck, finished for months, is a perfect place to sit and look out over the view. The photo above was taken from the same place I looked out last December — but from the rail around the deck instead of from a piece of plywood balanced on the deck supports.

The folks who read this blog and see my Twitter and Facebook posts might be sick of me sharing this view. But I can’t ever get sick of it. I wish I could share it with everyone.