To the editor:

My husband and I have worked for the last 32 years building our life in the country. We started out in a small mobile home with the dream of some day building our dream house on the hill. We worked, we saved, we planned and after 16 years we were finally able to start on our dream.

There was an old house that sat on the exact spot where we built our home. The house was over 100 years old and was the house my husband grew up in. It wasn’t habitable any longer, so we sought out a local person that was interested in disassembling the old house and using the hand hewed logs and cellar rocks to build his home.

We’ve spent the last 16 years working towards the day our mortgage would be behind us and we could start living “the good life.” We’ve given up things many people can’t imagine living without — internet access, cell service, nearby shopping and dining —because to us it’s worth it to live in the peace and serenity of the country.

Our son recently moved back home with his wife and their son and started living their dream of living in the country. Their son is the fifth generation to live on the land. Now the Mid-States Corridor project is threatening to take everything we’ve worked so hard for.

Our story is the same story many people are facing today if this project moves forward. We will have to give up our homes, land and security. We will be forced to move (likely out of Indiana) and find new jobs and a new way of life, right at the time we should be kicking back and enjoying the fruits of our labor. We will be forced to leave family, lifelong friends and neighbors.

We never imagined in a million years we’d be fighting this fight. But here we are, fighting for the life we’ve worked so hard for. Please make your voices heard and say NO to the Mid-States Corridor project.

—Michelle Keller
Dubois