green grace...

Come thou fount of every blessing, tune my heart to sing thy grace… Living on a farm is hard work at many levels. The physical labor can be taxing but the spiritual discipline kicks my butt.

Mucking the stalls is a piece of cake compared to making a decision whether an old cow, crippled and barely able to move, should live or die. Fanny is 23 years old. She and her twin, Annie, have borne many calves for Daddy and for us. She is the only cow we have I can milk and in spite of her horns, she is a gentle, sensible cow. She doesn’t appear to be living with pain so we are keeping her in retirement, much as we did the old bull, Ferdinand. Every day I feed Fannie something special. Sometimes I give her sweet feed or bread or corn cobs and shucks. Squash is a favorite. She hobbles to me and chews contentedly while I scratch her ears. Winter is coming, though, and a hard decision is coming along with it.

We have another much needed hay cutting coming in September if the weather co-operates. The first cutting did not yield enough to get us through the winter. Every time we cut hay, small animals like field mice get caught in the mower and are killed. Buzzards come in and clean up the fields before we bale usually.

 A young blue heron has taken up residence occasionally at our little pond. Fish are plentiful and he and the snapping turtle co-exist amiably, apparently. The algae have exploded because of the dry heat with no rain. Frogs, dragonflies, mosquitoes and snakes call this pond home, too. Every day the deer family visits… a buck, two does and two fawns… along with turkeys and their broods.  Their life is as fragile as ours. Hunting season, coyotes, bobcats, and disease are realities in their life, and mine.

How can I find green grace in the midst of life and death on the farm and in my soul? I sing a lot… no surprise to my Sistah Catherine. Old hymns are favorites, along with the new songs I have learned in my predominantly African American church. Whistling along with singing is a guaranteed grace experience for me. My Bible reading has been distilled to the Psalms and the gospels. I find less and less meaning in using the Bible to reinforce my beliefs and more to say grace over in the sustaining love in the Psalms and Jesus’ life. Watching young fawns and young calves jump and play in lush green fields keeps my heart leaping in joy along with them.  The passage of time with seasons giving their individual gifts, the evidence of life in the presence of death, the sounds of joy with children laughing and donkeys braying, tune my heart to sing God’s grace. I am blessed and I am grateful.