La Verkin - Our Last Stop in Utah

Pine Valley Mountains

We moved to La Verkin, Utah, into a small rural community of 4K+ residents with a distant view of the Pine Valley Mountains, a fascinating location with incredible geologic facts and significantly cooler summer temperatures compared to La Verkin. There are no taxis or Ubers in La Verkin and it is common to see yards with horses grazing and chickens running the land. The local terrain held some mammoth rock canyon formations and off trail type hiking paths right in our neighborhood where the confluence of Ash Creek and La Verkin Creek join the Virgin River which flows east into Zion National Park and beyond. 

LaVerkin Creek Trail

After the bustle of St. George, La Verkin’s energy was a welcomed low key experience. Nathan and I dove into setting up our household enjoying lots of high end thrift store shopping in nearby St. George and the small town of Hurricane next door (pronounced "Her-ah-kun" ) known for powerful winds common to the region.  An almost constant wind flow drove terra cotta colored sandstone dust into our closed windows and onto our window sills. I didn’t mind that at all and I still love that coloration. We bought home grown vegetables from a local home based business. I connected with a wonderful local merchant and sold some of my jewelry in her beautiful shop right on the main road. Nathan built a rock garden (of course), and began exploring the local habitat.

Watching occasional, rare snowfalls was especially exciting! So rare that I can't find those photos! My favorite and most majestic memories, though, are from hiking the Red Cliffs Recreation Area in nearby Leeds. 

Red Cliffs Recreation Area

Four months into our lease, the pandemic knocked on America’s door.  All attempts by us to make new friends and socialize in a local rock club were suspended and we hunkered down with his rocks and my beads, heading out to wide open spaces, enjoying the mystical land on which we felt privileged to live. It became a very lonely existence to have left our tribe behind in Florida and live in isolation. We were literally “strangers in a strange land”. Nathan did lots of local rock hunting on his own and often returned with 40 pounds in his backpack. 

Just across the street from our apartment

One morning, the La Verkin Policement Department knocked on our door to investigate us as possible squatters due to the neighborhood’s suspicions surrounding Nathan’s comings and goings, bundled tightly against the cold and always harnessed to a backpack.  We welcomed their visit!  LOL

All this said, our stay in La Verkin provided a healing of some type as the solidarity of silence and introspection brought out all “the life long uglies” I carried and had yet to be disposed of. Like many others during the pandemic period of sheltering-in-place, I came to know myself in such a different way. Literally, as we approached La Verkin with all our earthly possessions, I had secretly “surrendered” to the mountains for whatever healing the Universe felt was appropriate. Well, eventually all hell broke loose.  That said,  I have no regrets for all that unfolded during that time. It was a freeing experience from which I still carry the results. It also set the stage for my next healing that would take place in Tucson, Arizona. La Verkin was right where we belonged at the time. We stayed there longer than a year due to the pandemic but - finally vaccinated and motivated - we decided that Tucson was our next, and likely, our last stop. This time, we loaded up a rental  truck and our car and set out as a small caravan to the unknown.

Watch for next month's post from Tucson, our final stop in the Southwest.

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A Dream Unfolding

We had the Universe’s attention. Once our belongings began to melt away during The Big Purge, we moved into the next phase of our journey. It became clear that it was time to put our house on the market. Because of its location, we sensed that it would sell quickly. You see, our ¾ acre homestead was bordered on two sides by a century old cemetery the owner of whom had approached us several times over the 25 years we lived there. 

All we had to do was call my very good friend, who happened to be a realtor, to extend an offer.  While we were attending a pre-planned trip to the Tucson Gem & Mineral Show in January 2019, we received a response to the proposal. In fact, due to our delay in responding for several days, the offer got upped!  Just as fortuitous, we were able to negotiate staying in the house rent free until May.  It all felt like a dream.  What we never knew at the time was that we would eventually end up living the rest of our lives in Tucson.  But that's a whole other story for later.

When we returned from the Show we ramped up for leaving Florida in May.  We downsized our transportation and became a one-car family, purchasing a used Ford Flex with seating for seven all of which was easy to collapse and make room for our precious cargo. In stages, we began packing the moving boxes that Nathan, an experienced “tucker”,  altered to fit and stack within the car. Of course, my load of beads got special placement as I planned to bead cross country! For the next few months, the boxes took over the center of the house as we calculated  and recalculated the available space.

We continued to downsize our belongings as we realized they just wouldn’t fit. Most notable among them were treasured artwork pieces by Nathan and my folding clothes rack that had belonged to my mother. Ouch. 

During this time, I created an itinerary for an eleven-day journey to Utah with 7 stops along the way.  I planned one last monthly coffee with “the girls” at our home and we had a little ceremony in the backyard. I researched and rented a VRBO in St. George, Utah, for four months, not knowing where we intended to live in the area. We began to say goodbye to the home where we had lived together over twenty years. We built more fires in the backyard pit, savoring the Southeast’s earthy lushness we were leaving behind for the arid, mountainous Southwest.

It is truly the oddest feeling- surreal, for sure - to literally walk out of a house you know you will never see again. A vessel that held love, transcendent healing, and a once-in-a-lifetime community of purpose. Your feet will no longer feel the hardwood floors installed in 1948. The house parties with upwards of fifty guests, the gourmet holiday meals with friends and family are over and done. It is finished. You are free. 

In certain ways I will always be tied to the sacred space we left behind and what I experienced there.  I call this my “Ode to Chez Levy”.

 

Watch for next month's post where we set off for Utah!

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A Wider Perspective on A Big Purge

I’ve been following this young woman and her husband for way over five years on Facebook. They are an extraordinarily talented couple with big plans and accomplishments that continue to unfold in their lives and directly impact the lives of their community.  Labeling them as adventurous souls feels inadequate. When I read Liza’s recent Facebook post on purging their homestead - in fact, her childhood home - I felt compelled to share her powerful words. She was happy to oblige!  Her words go deep and, like every word she writes [unedited], inspiration abounds and the hearts of her readers are touched with Truth. She has described The Big Purge so much better than I did in my last post by taking this subject to the next level.  - Tina Levy 

Liza

Posted on Facebook March 13, 2026 by Liza Piza Balstein

For the past few months, I’ve kept a mantra in my head like a skipping record: everything and everyone has its place. It’s a small sentence, but it has carried me through. It keeps me grounded when things feel chaotic, and it reminds me that even when I can’t see the full picture, there is still a larger ecosystem that I’m part of and can tap into at anytime.

That idea has helped me as we began the daunting task of emptying this house that’s held more than forty years of belongings from several different lives. The sheer volume of things was overwhelming. Every room contained layers of objects—some sentimental, some practical, many forgotten. Sorting through it all forced me to ask a constant question: where does this belong now?

The things is, I'm stubborn. And I have done just about everything I can do to avoid the landfill. Throwing everything away or packing it up to be stored in some unit somewhere else felt like the easiest solution, but it also felt wrong. If something is still useful, meaningful, or necessary and we can't bring it with us, I believed there was still a place for it somewhere.

In the process of redistributing these belongings, I ended up having more than a thousand exchanges with people. Some items were sold, but much of it was simply given away. What started as a logistical challenge gradually became something much more human. Each interaction was a small moment of connection with someone from a different walk of life. A chair, a tool, a set of dishes, or a compost bin became the starting point for conversations and shared stories.

Watching something that had been sitting unused in a house for years suddenly become valuable again in someone else’s life-- especially to those living on tight incomes, people struggling to make ends meet, or individuals who didn’t even speak English as their first language, it created a powerful sense that even in this small way, with intention things can move back into balance.

Over time, the experience started to feel like more than just clearing out a house. It became a lesson in how imbalance works. Often, things in the world are not broken because they need to be destroyed; they’re simply out of place. One person has too much while another goes without. Useful objects sit idle while someone else struggles to afford them. When that happens, the answer isn’t always to discard or erase—it may simply be to move things into better alignment.

Many of the problems we face, both personally and collectively, seem to grow out of imbalance. We often respond by trying to eliminate or obliterate what feels wrong. But sometimes the better response is to reposition—to help restore equilibrium rather than start from scratch.

In a small way, it was my part in helping restore balance to the world. It turned disposal into connection. It reminded me that objects carry usefulness beyond the moment we stop needing them, and that people are often far more willing to help one another than we assume.

Most of all, it reinforced the belief that everything and everyone has a place. Our responsibility is not necessarily to control the entire system, but to participate in it thoughtfully—to notice when something is out of alignment and, where we can, help guide it toward a better place.

The larger picture may always remain partly out of view. But even without seeing it fully, we can still take part in the quiet work of restoring balance around us.

Let me know! Sending you all lots and lots of love!

Wishing you Well in All Ways Always,

Eliza Epstein

Holistic Health Specialist

WWW.Wholesomelyhealing.com

Eliza Bailstein is a writer, teacher and Holistic Health Specialist at Wholesomely Healing LLC specializing in Mental, Physical and Emotional Wellbeing. She and her husband are traveling nomads who travel with their van and teardrop-shaped teeny-tiny home. Together, they co-founded Rising Light and have organized hundreds of hands-on workshops related to holistic natural health practices, communication and conflict resolution skill-building, joyful self-expression, and environmental regeneration.

You can read her insightful, thought-provoking essays by subscribing to her Substack: https://substack.com/@elizabailstein

And learn about their non-profit at BeamingLove.org and her business at WholesomelyHealing.com

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Watch for next month's post from Tina about finding closure when it's time to "leave the building..."

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The Big Purge

Something is in the air and it deserves some talking about. Relocation or maybe it's better called Migration. I’m wondering if it’s my imagination or if an inordinate number of people are uprooting to seek life elsewhere, even overseas. ( I realize that some citizens are fleeing our country.)

I’m not sure if it’s because Nathan and I have been through a cross country move that I am more aware of others pulling up roots and moving on. I am especially aware of young couples

Envisioning Life “Out West”

Returning from Arizona in 2016 - [See prequel Jan. 2026 blog post] - Nathan and I began to play with the fantasy of relocating to the Southwest.   Personally, I began to consider what such a move could mean for me. Would it be safe for me to leave everything and everyone behind -  at retirement age and after 30 years in a community - and move cross country?  Would my husband and I hold our tight bond regardless of any adversity we might face in a new setting? We had both failed in prior marriages so I might have been terrified at the prospect of becoming a “stranger in a stranger land” if this well intentioned adventure ruined our marriage. To my surprise and great relief, all of these thoughts were brief and fleeting. After 20 years with Nathan, my guts had "a knowing" that this marriage was indeed solid.  This wasn't the first time that my guts had delivered this message.  

Snow Canyon, Ivins, UT near St. George

Our decision to leave the nest was so easy that it had to have held a cosmic force behind it.   In 2017, we began planning for when to sell the house, what to purge, where to live, and the logistics for getting there. Getting where? Would we become nomads? Where would we visit? Were we looking for a permanent home? We studied maps. We dreamed of the life we wanted to live. We decided to wander without commitment and to head for St. George, Utah, for starters. We hoped to stay for a year and make side trips of a couple hundred miles out from there. When we were “done” there,  we planned to center ourselves in another spot and repeat the cycle until we decided to settle down.

How would we get there? We started shopping for a big comfortable car that would take everything we could pack into it for the long drive to move cross country. Everything else had to go.  We started planning for a huge purge of our possessions. Watch for next month's post about our year long effort to lessen our load!

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Moving into the Now Moment

Much has been written about the Now Moment so I'm not going to explain it here. I just want to say that I think I've been inducted into this special space in the past few weeks. I haven't had much to write about from a philosophical angle and I am not into writing a travel log or sharing all the daily details of life so I've been remiss in posting to my blog. I really haven't had much to say. Then it hit me this morning that I've been busy "being" instead of "doing". Yes, I've been active during many of the "being" moments but the joy in those moments has been constant and timeless.  To me timelessness resides in a Now Moment. There is no past and no future, just now.  This my life now. My goal is to keep it that way.

So for those not on Facebook, you've missed a number of posts that I will present here pictorially... while I was "being". We have continued to hike and, more recently, bike!  And I've made some phenomenal necklaces which you can see on my website.  I am working on connecting with retailers downtown to sell it all. I have to make room for more!  This one is my current favorite.

I'm learning to control my bike before I risk live and limb on local bike trails which exist all over St. George. Right now I ride the local neighborhood streets and do figure eights in the parking lot where we live. This is a biking town! It is energizing and youth-ifying...  (a made up word). 

Sunday morning's walk took us to the Crosby Family Confluence Park where the Santa Clara runs into the Virgin River. Some bike trails are shared with pedestrians (like us) but the bikes get priority. This helped us decide to go get some bikes.

The skies, clouds, and sunsets here are phenomenal...  Until next time, savor your Now Moments!

Settling In

Settling in isn't as easy as it sounds.  The occasional uneasiness I feel during any one day tells me that I am in the process of settling in, whatever that is supposed to mean. We've only been here 17 days now. As you know, patience isn't one of my virtues so I have been (naively?) hoping that after unpacking the car and arranging our things, finding the grocery stores that suit our lifestyle, and setting a daily routine of walking these incredible St. George trails, some of the foreignness would melt away. And some of it has, actually. I can now take a shower and have all my things at my fingertips instead of searching through a travel cosmetic bag.  My pots and pans have taken over the kitchen here and the resident pots are stored away. Luckily, our furnished condo has the best of furniture and we sleep so well in its king size bed.  I was not expecting a plug and play experience when we moved away from everything we owned and everyone we knew, don't get me wrong. In fact, I wanted a complete change and that's what I'm getting. I'm not saying that any one thing is bothering me just that I feel like a fish out of water.

My studio is setup here but it is not the same studio I had there. Far from it. My creative energy wants there and it cannot have it. So I am ignoring the new studio and have moved to the living room couch in front of the TV (not) watching with Nathan but working on jewelry there. There is a sort of "clingy-ness" between myself and Nathan, me to him. I have a studio here but it's not that studio.  Something about sitting in my domain, that studio was feeding my soul. Now something is missing.  I spent a large portion of my day in there and that part of my life has to be recreated.  We will move from here in four months so this is really just an interim studio. I am learning from this rental just how to manage the next one. Until we decide to settle down in one place, this will be the drill.

I am missing the companionship of my girlfriends even though we did not see each other all that often. One month ago, a phone call could mean a lunch date or at least a nice phone chat over coffee. Those phone chats over coffee are something I am beginning to reach out for now that I'm (a little more) settled.  As I reread this I realize that settling in (for me) literally means transitioning into a new environment.  And so this is the way it must be for now.  I thank my lucky stars I still have all my jewelry making supplies to feed my creative needs, and I am pleasantly surprised that my creativity does not get derailed by the television in front of me.  I am wrapping stones and creating some gorgeous original pieces!  The energy in the mountainous trails we explore is feeding me.

I am beginning to enjoy cooking again with MY pots and pans. (smile). In past years I was preoccupied for so long with other activities--usually business related-- that cooking became more of a have-to than a want-to. Nathan did much of the cooking (thank God)! Now unencumbered, I have time to focus more on preparing fresh foods for cooking and returning to the cooking ritual that always soothed me.  I am more aware of what I am feeding my body. I feel better physically. Mentally is up for grabs (for now).

I just wanted to share the reality of what is happening here in our new location. I don't quite know how to end this post other than to try to say something funny.  How about "Mama said there'd be days like this.."? My Love to all of you...

Receiving with ease

I learned about the phrase "receive with ease" as a Unity truth student in the mid-90's. My interpretation of it has meant to accept the goodness that comes my way and not question whether or not I deserve it.  It also tells me not to wonder if there is "a catch" to such good fortune.  For me, that has meant learning to "relax into" the gifts I receive and savor the good feelings they invoke within my being.  In other words, let my self feel the love. Without going into detail, let's just say that I was very often disappointed growing up and learned not to expect people to keep their promises or build hope that what was promised would actually happen (for me).  So the importance of learning this concept has helped me to expect that good is always intended for me, that I deserve to have all the goodness (gifts) that come my way, and that if I am -- for any reason -- disappointed in the outcome of my expectations then that gift was not intended for me. "Don't take anything personally" -from chapter two of The Four Agreements by Don Miguel- contributed to my understanding of this concept. This is a comforting concept to embrace!

All this comes to my mind this morning as I experience all the good feelings and unexpected gifts from having moved across country from Florida, the verdant humid paradise, to Utah, the arid extremity of red rock, black lava and peeping greens that pop!  My heart is so grateful for the gift that Nathan and I have given ourselves with our life decision to purge and play for this indefinite period.  We have set the stage for new adventures, all of which will come wrapped in western sunrises and sunsets, vistas of red and orange and rust and black.  The energy of the mountains is the most powerful gift of all, to contribute to our spirits, our physical energy and youth, and the depth of our relationship.

Are we tired yet? Absolutely! We are somewhat exhausted by months of preparation that went into making this move.  The funny thing is that we agree the 11 day journey here felt more like a 4 day journey. Why? We don't care why. We accept the gift. We know it was just another sign that we are Supported in taking this step.  So now we rest and revel in our new surroundings, getting back to home cooking, sleeping without having to get up and attend to anything other than resting and eating and taking a walk. Our new home --for the next 4 months--has turned out to be a place for a perfect retreat from everything!  We haven't heard one siren. Instead, we hear absolute silence, and outside just the birds and an occasional golf cart drifting by on batteries. THANK YOU is all we can say!

We have left the building!

Reserved just for us... But I will be the first one in that bed tonight at my brother-in-law's house. This project has come to an end and we celebrated with a wonderful dinner. We leave tomorrow.

It was a wonderful day taping up boxes, finding room for it all in the car, and tidying up the house and yard. We are leaving it in such a beautiful state. Even though it was hot out we did one final small fire in the pit. Nathan drank a cold beer and I had a cold seltzer. We walked the yard and thanked it for feeding us such wonderful food and giving us such beauty to witness. We went through every room in the house admiring the colors and its cleanliness and the views out the windows. We said goodbye to it. I did a pictorial on the house for old times sake. I hope to share some of it with you in the near future. Now I am going to sleep like a woman freed from responsibility for a home. Good night my friends.

Moving to another planet at 65

I've moved from Maine to Illinois to Florida to New Jersey and back to Florida in my life time. I was thirty-something the last time. At sixty-five, here are my thoughts about moving...

• A large part of my identity is tied up in this house: steward of the land, hostess with the mostest, chef extraordinaire, hearty parties, welcome wagon, etc., and most recently, artist.
• It's almost like dying, leaving "this life".  Having to say goodbye to people you know you won't see again. Giving away precious possessions you hope will retain some meaning for those who receive them. 
• There are memories encased in the "physical stuff" you have carried since you set up housekeeping after high school graduation.
• Yes, I got a little "homesick" but I was so much less attached to the importance of community. I didn't value friendships the way I do today. We think we have "forever"...
• There were no social media or cell phones for any of my interstate moves so it was much harder to stay in touch. You had to pay by the minute to talk to anyone you knew! Can you imagine?
• How do you make friends and develop community when you drop in unannounced? You can't expect people to know you are coming and welcome you.

This time around...

• I have managed to get blessed with the best partner possible to go with me on this new leg of life.
• The artist in me is going to help me transition to other spaces. I have been known to make jewelry on other road trips.  My jewelry also opens doors with people who admire what I wear.
• Friends are excited and authentically happy for us, telling us that we are brave. No one has dared to tell us that we must be crazy! They are just smiling and wishing us the best.  Some are secretly wishing they could come with us...
• 
  We are literally free to go, mobile, root-less, and unencumbered, for the most part.
• Social media and cell phones exist. Amen!
• We have some old and new friends out West that we can visit when we feel an urge to nest with our past and relax in shared history 
• We have new friends we have never met who waiting for us to visit them north of our initial stop.  Thank you, Facebook.
• It's going to be a fulfilling adventure!