Friday at the farm...

Friday at Sabbath Rest Farm... I woke up at six thirty with my three o’clock in the morning list on my mind. It was going to be a busy day. The donkeys were braying and the roosters ( those cute chicks weren’t all hens) crowing. There was no more sleep for me. I went to the kitchen and brewed my first cup of tea making a sequential list in my head as the dark black magic of Darjeeling worked, waking me up and getting me moving. Meister Eckhart said “Wisdom consists in doing the next thing you have to do, doing it with your whole heart, and finding delight in doing it.” My whole day was going to be one of those days where I could take delight in doing one thing after another.
At ten o’clock a group of pastoral counselors from all over the mountains were coming to our house to spend the day. These men and women were trained in the art and science of pastoral care, the melding of faith and psychology. They have used their skills to bind up the broken hearted, have listened and heard the unspeakable hurts. As wounded healers, they have struggled to name their own broken places and their knowledge is not just in their heads but in their souls. These men and women range in age from sixty to eighty, some still working full time, some part time, some morphed into different occupations and others fully retired. Whatever their primary professional identification, whether professor, pastor, author, or full time counselor, the bedrock of their working lives has been their soul work as pastoral counselors. Now they are beginning to meet on a regular basis here at the farm, doing what they know how to do best, tending to others and themselves, becoming community.
I began setting the tables using real plates, cloth napkins, Aunt Nina’s silver and the Fostoria glasses Michael’s mother gave us... red, blue, yellow and green... the colors of summer. Big bouquets of mint freshened the air. Michael left to go get the salad supplies while I ran the vacuum, made tea, straightened up, cleaned around the edges and got ready for company. Before everyone came, I fed the dogs, cats, donkeys and horses making a quick pass at the stalls gathering up the night time poop deposits.
After serving lunch, I left to make the deposit run to the bank in Mars Hill stopping back by my favorite little idiosyncratic store, Rose’s, for a walk through. They often have Land’s End shirts for the grandsons for three dollars so I cruise through the store once or twice a week. Keeping young boys in shirts and shorts can be an expensive proposition so I enjoy shopping for them and finding bargains. Michael’s mother did this for us and those clothes care packages were like Christmas gifts of love sprinkled throughout the year. I continue the tradition. I spent the rest of the afternoon with mama talking and napping. I came up the hill to our house around four thirty in time to say good by to everyone as they scattered, leaving to return to their lives away from each other.
Michael and I sat on the front porch talking through the day for a few minutes. The wisdom and good humor of the group lingered with us as we remembered each person who had come, named them, and gave thanks for the old and new friends in this group. Some of these folks have been a part of our lives for forty years. How I wish there were a way to distill and share the depth and breadth of experience and knowledge contained in this group with others at the beginning of their journeys who might have the same calling.
I called my friend Mary Beth. It was Zach’s high school graduation party night. Because I wasn’t sure when the group would end, I had not responded to the invitation. I called to see if they had any extra burgers they could throw on the grill. They did so we headed out to celebrate the ending of our young friend’s public school career and the beginning of his travel through the wider world of learning in college. Zach and I had spent endless hours painting porch ceilings and deck railings together while we were building the house three years ago. Conversations were wide ranging and fascinating. At opposite ends of age and life experience, we found common ground as question askers and answer seekers. His hopes and dreams for the future bumped up against my hopes and dreams from the past. We became friends. He has grown in so many ways and I see the outlines of who he is becoming. I won’t be here for all of his life but I would be willing to bet he will make a difference in the world, a positive force for good, a believer who knows the darkness always gives way to the Light and is willing to work holding his lamp high.
What an interesting juxtaposition of lives lived and life yet to be lived. Endings, which are just as important as beginnings, are so often opened doors to new life. If we can find the courage to walk through those doors, letting go of the past, stepping out in faith that God is not done with us yet, there are all sorts of discoveries, new questions and answers, work to be done that we have never done before. “In the struggle to try to understand what we know, and think about what we understand, we develop ourselves, and each person finds the truth the only way he can— by living it!”(Brigid Marlin) Zach and the pastoral counselors, me and mama, all of us finding our truths in the living of our days sheltered and called out by the One who gave us this amazing gift of life. Thanks be to God for this gift that keeps on giving.

Silt ponds for the soul...

The pond is filling up again with water from the stream after years of being a mud hole. When a careless developer upstream scraped the top off a hill without adequate erosion control measures, rains sent red clay mud straight down the stream filling up our twelve foot deep pond. We have lived with the results of his carelessness for years watching the mud sprout weeds and puddles grow mosquitoes. The mediated settlement money enabled us to rebuild the pond in time for the summer.
The fishing chapel is surrounded by water and a little waterfall provides the prelude for Sunday worships. There is a rock walkway over the stream and we will have a bench to sit on in the shade near the water. A shallow swimming hole carved out above the waterfall provides a resting place to cool off for dogs and children. Little minnows are already making their home there waiting to slide over the rocks down into the bigger pond. When you walk by the pond now, you hear the splish splash of frogs diving in to their newly remodeled home. In time, soon we hope, the old blue crane will find his way back to us and the snapping turtle will return from wandering up and down the road to settle in once more. Children (and non-children) will be able to stand on the fishing deck to throw their line out to catch fish again. Fishing in my daddy’s pond was always a great adventure for my children. Now our grandchildren can learn patience (they never bite all the time) and courage ( try putting a cricket or worm on a hook) fishing with Pop or Grandma. I help bait hooks but do not fish...
But the most essential part of the pond is unseen, tucked away a little bit upstream in the berry patch. We dug a deeper hole, a silt pond, and made it accessible with the tractor. A wall of gravel and rip rap serve as a filter for the water as it makes its way to the pond. Water going out is much cleaner than water coming into the hole. When it fills up with mud, we can clean it out with the scoop on the front of the tractor. Now we have some protection from other development as well as the natural forces that bring dirt downstream.
Watching the silt pond last night, I got to wondering where the silt ponds are for my life. The water of life is a year round stream, sometimes full of trash and mud, sometimes clear and bubbling. Surely I can build places to catch the debris before I am filled up with a muddy mess, lost and mired in the muck. Writing is one of my silt ponds. I take time to think and reflect, read and pray. Usually nothing profound, no Damascus Road experiences happen but the rushing stream of my life has some time to settle and clear a little. Feeding the animals, the donkeys and horses and cows and cats and dogs (I don’t do chickens... those belong to Michael), helps remind me I am only a part of the greater Creation, not its center. Working in hay affirms the truth that life is difficult and easy, sweaty and refreshing, hard work with a payday, and gives me renewed appreciation for my grandparents whose living depended upon their farm work. Praying, conversation with God while paying attention to the water of life, is another filter for the muddiness of life in this imperfect world.
The old hymn we used to sing at Pinetta Baptist Church gives me a lovely prayer for my silt pond soul. “Purer in heart, O God, help me to be; May I devote my life wholly to Thee: Watch Thou my wayward feet, guide me with counsel sweet; Purer in heart, help me to be.” As the muddy waters of life wash through my soul, be my gravel wall, Lord. Help me to become purer, clearer, sweeter in heart, mind and body. I love you and long to be your loving child. “Teach me to do Thy will most lovingly” as I wade in the muddy waters. Thank you for this most amazing gift of life and life here on the farm. I am grateful. Amen.