I walked out to the gate headed down to the stable and smelled the sharp tang of wood smoke hanging heavy in the air. The air was cold, crisp and clear. The ground was white with frost. A cloud lay in the valley below blotting out the sight of the other houses on the farm. Junie B spoke to me and the donkeys complained about my being too slow. I fed Bud the Barn Cat, put out morning hay, set the captives free and mucked out the stalls. When I walked back up to the house, the cloud was slowly fading away as the sun rose in the valley. Like the musical Brigadoon, a little community was coming into view wrapped in soft edges. I stood for a moment and savored the beginning of my day, gave thanks for the beauty that surrounds me, went in to cook breakfast for Michael... some of his eggs fresh from his hens.
It was hay baling day, the last of this season...freeze dried by now after several days of frost and warm sun. Little Michael was back from his time in Winston-Salem with his new used pick up truck ready to work. His exuberant greeting and hearty hug set the mood for the day’s work. We did stable work, traded out the screens on the side porch for the winter glass panels, he and Michael did some fence work, and it was lunch time. Soup for lunch and short naps... time to bale hay.
It wasn’t much hay, just 140 bales or so, dry and light mostly. I stacked alone since Diane’s hip is out, and Leisa drove the truck and trailer. That is no small job since you have all the men telling you where to go next and how to get there. The men, whom God blessed with more upper body strength and am I glad, tossed the bales into the trailer and we stacked them five rows high for the drive home. After unloading the hay in Gary’s barn, we three went to eat supper at mama’s. She had cooked for us... roast beef, her famous mashed potatoes, rutabagas, peas, beans and cake. It is such a good gift to come home to a meal made ready for you after work in the fields. We gave thanks and ate like we meant it.
We drove up to our house and I got out to go stable the horses and feed them. I stepped out of the Kawasaki mule and looked up at the night sky. It took my breath away. Clear, dark night with more stars than my eye could count, light from far away in time and space, bathing my upturned face in their shining blessing. I got lost in the otherness of the sky world that is beyond my understanding and sang my evening blessing... “Now the day is over, night is drawing nigh, shadows of the evening, steal across the sky. Jesus, give the weary calm and sweet repose; with thy tenderest blessing, may our eyelids close. When the morning wakens, then may I arise pure, and fresh, and sinless in they holy eyes.” It was a good day, a very good day and I did rejoice in it.
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