The drive in does most of the work. The light comes through the woods slowly, because there's nothing out here to hurry it. By the time you reach the house, the day you just had is mostly behind you.

Inside, the floors are warm. Radiant heat, edge to edge, so you'll stop wearing shoes indoors by December. Above you, 150 hand-peeled red pines hold up the roof — cut nearby, left to dry a year and a half, and set by the man who owned the log company. This one was his own. He built a sawmill out of a Honda motorcycle to cut the timbers. He milled the oak and cherry floors from his own trees. The front entry came out of old picture windows somebody was throwing away. Someone forged the iron latches. Someone carved the back door. And over the main room there's a modified Scottish hammer beam truss you will catch yourself looking at more often than you'd expect.

Nothing here meets at a right angle, and that was the point. Three bedrooms upstairs, a balcony off the primary, a dining room with a Frank Lloyd Wright feel to the windows and paneling. 2,368 square feet, plus a basement with the ceiling height to become whatever you need it to be.

Outside, 1.37 acres climb into the woods. A mowed path runs up to a rock outcropping at the top. Morels in spring, wine caps and shiitake on inoculated logs. The birds are usually louder than the road. At night, you can see stars.

Then it changes on you four times a year. Spring comes in green and close. Summer is shade and long evenings on the porch. October is the one people talk about. Then the snow settles and the place turns into the postcard version of itself.

Ten minutes from the city. Worlds away from it. There isn't another one.