The afternoon light filters through the towering pines behind Bronwyn's home in Idyllwild, casting dancing shadows across her garden. At 80, she moves through her space with the ease of someone who has finally stopped running. Though it took most of her life, and several men, to bring her here.

"David," she says, gesturing to her husband of 19 years, "is the one who made me stay."

But that's getting ahead of the story.

Paris during the Vietnam War

Bronwyn was born into movement. Her father, a Navy supply corps officer, moved the family from base to base: Boston, Staten Island, Pennsylvania, Hawaii, Virginia, Washington, back to Virginia. By the time she graduated from high school in Newport, Rhode Island, home was wherever the Navy sent them.

When her parents finally gave the children a choice about their next posting, one option was Paris. For Bronwyn, who had won prizes in high school for her French, the answer was obvious.

She spent three years at the American College in Paris, a brand-new school with only 225 students and professors on sabbatical from Stanford and Harvard. "It was the most incredible experience," she remembers. But Paris during the Vietnam War meant constant confrontation. "Whenever you met a French person, if you were an American, you were attacked about the war."

Her French became fluent enough that she could pass for Swiss or Canadian, avoiding those painful conversations entirely.

Years of twists and turns followed: Los Angeles in the late 1960s, the women's movement, consciousness-raising groups, marching against the war. A degree in early childhood education from Pacific Oaks, a Quaker school in Pasadena. Then the discovery: "I was much more interested in the parents than the children."

Massage therapy. Bookkeeping. Publishing. She edited Ralph Blum's Book of Runes, a collaboration that began when she'd broken her collarbone and couldn't work as a masseuse. "The book is still selling 43 years later. We've sold over 2 million copies."

People would ask: "You're a massage therapist, a publisher and a bookkeeper?"

"It's all the same," she'd reply. "It's balancing energy."

Men and Mountains

The first time Bronwyn came to Idyllwild, she was in her mid-thirties, brought by a boyfriend named Jack, a Rolfer who worked with dancers at Idyllwild Arts during the summer. "My father was in the Navy. We always lived near the ocean. I didn't know anything about the mountains."

But Jack loved nature, and the mountain started to work its way into her consciousness. She'd return a few more times over the years with different partners, each visit adding another layer to her understanding of this place.

Years later, a client asked her to be his agent. He'd found two agents in Los Angeles and asked his friend David which one to choose. David said, "Go with Bronwyn Jones." He didn't know her at all, he just liked the name.

When they finally met for dinner at David's house in Topanga Canyon, something shifted. "He was sitting in front of these windows with a view of the red rocks, wearing this purple silk shirt, and the sun was doing this thing. When he started talking about his cabin in Idyllwild, there were golden rays all around him. He absolutely glowed."

David had bought a cabin in Idyllwild in 1971. Every weekend, he'd invite her up. "I said, 'Oh, no, I can't. I work seven days a week.' He would say, 'Just come up for the weekend. Bring your computer, bring your work.'"

She never plugged in the computer. "I never did anything except take long walks and cook wonderful meals and just start gardening."

The Body Decides

When breast cancer arrived, it crystallized everything. After a year of intensive treatment at Kaiser: "My life has got to change."

She looked at properties for a year, learning every corner of Idyllwild, Pine Cove, Cedar Glen. 

She bought her house 25 years ago. David kept her Venice apartment and commuted on weekends. "I swear that's why we were able to stay together. We couldn't come from more different backgrounds. He's from rural Minnesota, a little town. I'm this international Paris-Washington-DC girl."

They married in 2000, right in the living room, mostly for practical reasons. "I'd been hosting the Death Café for years. I knew that if you weren't married and you got sick, you couldn't even visit the person you lived with. We needed to be able to say, 'I know what she wants. I'm willing to do that.'"

The Symphony Returns

Two years ago, Bronwyn got hearing aids. She'd been slowly losing the high pitches that age steals first.

"When I got my hearing aids and walked outside for the first time, I went, 'Oh my God, listen to the birds!'" Her face lights up with the memory. "There's a symphony of birds."

Around her garden—the fountain trickling, the leaves rustling, the squirrels chattering. "I love the sound of the water. I love the rain when it rains. I love the quiet, the no sound."

After 33 years in Los Angeles, she hadn't realized how much she'd missed the seasons. "When I first moved to LA in '68, it didn't rain for nine months. I didn't know how much it was bothering me."

Then one night at three in the morning, thunder cracked and rain poured down. "I went, 'Oh my God, it's raining!' Everything inside of me went, 'Yes.' It was like a release."

Now she has her seasons back, all four of them. "I love each one, and then you get tired of them and you say, 'Oh, I'm so ready for it to change.' It's a wonderful rhythm."

The Japanese maple outside her window changes every day. "It starts yellow at the top, and then it makes its way down."

The Volunteer Republic

"This town," Bronwyn says with fierce pride, "is run by volunteer energy."

Idyllwild has no mayor—well, technically they do: Mayor Max, a dog. The real governance happens through approximately 25 to 30 nonprofits, all volunteer-run.

A French friend's husband volunteered for Woodies, chopping firewood. "I asked him, 'What do you love about Idyllwild?' He said, 'If we were in France, we'd just sit around and wait for the government to fix everything. Here in Idyllwild, somebody says, "We've got this problem," and a bunch of people say, "Yeah, it's a problem," and then they get together and have a meeting. They create a 501(c)(3), a nonprofit.'"

That's how you get to know people here: you volunteer.

She joined the Garden Club first, though she left when she realized the members were planting impatiens and other non-natives, not the California native plants she'd fallen in love with. Later, she met two other native plant enthusiasts, and together they started Lily Rock Native Gardens, a nursery they ran for four years. Now known as the Idyllwild Gardens, on North Circle Drive.

She spent ten years with the Friends of the Library, helping raise money to build Idyllwild's modern library. She helped found the Idyllwild Community Fund's fundraising efforts, which grew from $12,000 to over $400,000. 

She's been on the board of Spirit Mountain Retreat for 15 years and sings with Local Color, a women's chorus. She sits Zen every Thursday night. She hosts a meditation group every Sunday morning. There's her book group, her various "sanghas."

"What's difficult for a lot of the 501(c)(3)s is they're run by people who are older. We're all retired. We need to pass the baton because we can't do this forever." She hopes to find ways to invite younger people into the volunteer work. "It's such a wonderful way to get to know your community and to be of service."

Confronting Judgment

The town is changing. Since COVID, people have been arriving from San Diego, Los Angeles, Orange County, Palm Springs, buying properties with cash, turning them into Airbnbs. Rents have skyrocketed.

"I was talking to someone the other day, and I go, 'Oh no, there's another black cabin.' You know that if you walk in the front door, all the walls will be painted white. So not Idyllwild."

She pauses, catching herself. "There are a lot of city people who have moved up here and they bring what they know with them. White walls, gray furniture, black on the outside. And I'm just filled with judgment."

Another pause. "So then I have to confront my judgment and know that I can go to the Collective and to Raven Hill Bagels and experience all the energy of all these new young people. We're going through another iteration of Idyllwild. I'm 80 years old now. I'm an old folk. But I do have friends who are young."

Unlikely Friendship

Like Ari, 35 years old, young enough to be her grandson. They met at an all-day yoga and meditation retreat. "We just connected. We liked each other."

Ari fell in love with Idyllwild and moved here. Ari had been in a five-year relationship with Céline, who was French-Russian. "So we would speak French together."

The couple broke up. Céline left, but Ari stayed. When Spirit Mountain Retreat's all-female board discussed adding male energy, Bronwyn had an idea.

"We would periodically say, 'Maybe we should invite some male energy,' but then we'd go, 'No, no way. It would change everything. You put a man in the mix and the patriarchy comes up.'"

But Ari was different. "Ari is gender-fluid. Ari self-identifies as they/them. I said, 'I don't think we could handle a man on the board. Maybe we could handle Ari.'"

Ari has been on the board for several years now.

The Opposite of Anonymous

Everywhere Bronwyn goes, there are hugs and kisses, conversations. "I don't go anywhere where I don't see someone I know." 

"We all joke about this: Do I really have time to go to the post office? Because if you walk into the post office, you're going to see two or three people you know, and you're going to have to have a conversation. So it's going to take you 20 minutes to get out."

She remembers one night going into a restaurant with David. "We had reservations, but it took me nearly half an hour to get to our table because we knew everybody in the restaurant."

In LA, you can go days without running into anyone you know. "You can be anonymous, which can be wonderful if you want to be anonymous. But I'm really enjoying not being anonymous."

When someone in the community faces a health crisis, hundreds gather for fundraisers. Musicians come, people bring art, thousands of dollars are raised. "You can't do that in LA. Well, unless you're a famous person. But not as a normal community."

The Price of Paradise

When Bronwyn bought her house 25 years ago, fire insurance was $3,000 a year. This year: $8,000.

"The insurance issue is really a problem for a lot of people. Our taxes and insurance together are about the same as our mortgage. The only reason I can afford to live here is because I bought this house 25 years ago."

They've been evacuated three times in 35 years. "It's such a trip to walk out of your house and say, 'Okay, what am I taking with me?'" You take the cat. Paperwork for taxes. Your computer. Some food, maybe. Jewelry. Cash.

"You leave your door unlocked so the fire department can come in. You walk away from a house filled with memories. I have art everywhere, and every piece is a memory. My whole house is a house of memories. You just walk away and you don't know if you're ever going to see any of it again."

Then she says something unexpected: "What was amazing was how easy it was to walk away."

She attributes this to her military childhood: moving all the time, leaving home behind, starting over again. "I guess it wasn't as hard as it might be for someone else."

But what she remembers most isn't the fear, it's the connection. Even though everyone had evacuated, they stayed connected online, sharing information, supporting each other. Her friend Françoise, who refused to leave, made sure someone jumped the fence to water the $12,000 worth of plants at Bronwyn's nursery.

She has friends who lost their homes in recent fires. "Fire goes up, it doesn't go down. We were just on the ridge. We were so lucky."

The Trees Speak

There's a bench in Bronwyn's garden, positioned just so. Sitting there, looking up, the view is of an enormous Jeffrey pine stretching toward the sky, its branches creating a cathedral of green and shadow.

"That's what you get. That's what I live in. That's my guardian angel."

The wind moves through the needles, half whisper, half song. Birds call. The fountain trickles. Leaves rustle.

"The trees. It's the trees. They speak to me."

She's lived in cities from age 18 to 55. Now, at 80, she's finally still. Several men brought her to this mountain over the years, each visit leaving its mark. But it was David, with his purple silk shirt and his glowing face when he talked about Idyllwild, who made her stay.

That, and the birds. And the seasons. And the community that forms when people choose to show up for each other, again and again, in a tiny town at 5,000 feet where the mayor is a dog and the real governance happens through volunteer energy and love.

"I feel nourished by the people that I know, and I feel nourished by the beauty that surrounds me."

It's taken 80 years, three continents, countless moves, and numerous journeys up this mountain to find it. But she's finally home.