My new favorite book, recipient of two awards from teachers and the SPCA, is “The Goat Lady” written by Jane Bregoli. Beautiful watercolors are on every page with a story that does not preach at or talk down to children. It is a true story, a real story, a story like the stories Jesus told, that reaches deep into our souls and captures our best selves. It sits on my coffee table in the living room waiting for a visit from our grandchildren.
In the meantime, I have been watching people coming through my house pick it up, read it and look up with a sweet smile on their faces. At our church picnic Sunday, Pastor Pat read it as well as several others who couldn’t resist the title and the cover art. Like the “Velveteen Rabbit”, this book reminds us of truths that transcend culture and time.
The neighbors in this story, much like the folks in Jesus’ hometown, were willing to throw verbal stones, use legal means to oust the Goat Lady from her home. They did not know her and in their ignorance, chose to see her as a nuisance, an eyesore, a nothing. I’ve had to do some soul searching after reading this book, looking at my assumptions about those whom I do not know. Pastor Pat challenged us in her sermon Sunday to let go of what was holding us back… our preconceived notions about other people or ourselves… our unwillingness to move from the known into the unknown… our fears and our past. She called us to move out into the wilderness, strike a rock like Moses and wait on the water to flow. Easy to say. Hard to do.
Truth be told, I feel like the Goat Lady most days. The world seems to be moving so fast, change around every corner, strangers invading my space clamoring for their point of view, climate change that has altered the pattern of life in these ancient mountains, a farm lady who lives in the boondocks and loves it when most people live in cities with lights and noise and convenient shopping.
Some days I am overwhelmed with all the ways we keep in touch… Facebook, Twitter, E-mail, cell phones 24-7… and yet we seem to have lost touch in some very important ways. Speed of communication does not guarantee quality communication. Writing in the morning is one way I talk to God, to myself and to you. A visit from neighbors… Gary drives by in his Kubota with grandson Grayson in his car seat, Dianne comes by to check my beehive, Leisa drops by leave a plant start, Julie has some melon rinds for the chickens… brings slow talk, a hug or two, soft laughter, a new life beginning and my world turns right side up again.
Perhaps all God wants from us is some slow time talk, connection that does not depend upon the latest technological marvel, slowed down soul time that is face to face and heart to heart. Maybe all God wants us to do is to do the same for those we pass by in our days of busyness. Listen to the old man full of conversation at the checkout counter, really seeing the young Hispanic woman waiting on you at MacDonald’s, hearing your mother’s voice and seeing her as the vibrant young woman she once was, listening more and speaking less.
We sang one of Pastor Pat’s favorite hymns Sunday morning, “I Love the Lord Who Heard my Cry”. We sang it a capella and the richness of the individual voices lifted up in ragged song took my breath away. I heard Mamie and Mary and Jackie and Michael and Pat and Mark and Dave, all God’s children gathered for worship and communion singing. None of us the same and yet all of us alike. Our voices were water flowing from our rocky souls, running through the wilderness to the ears of God. This hymn has its roots in a Psalm and it will be my prayer for this day. “I love the Lord, because he has heard my voice and my supplications. Because he inclined his ear to me, therefore I will call on him as long as I live.” Slow soul talk…
Thursday, September 8, 2011
Monday, August 29, 2011
Toilet cleaning and other meaningful work...
Forty two years of marriage… calculating cleaning toilets for forty of those years once a week (two years off for vacations and hired help sometimes), I have cleaned one toilet 2080 times. Some of those years we had multiple bathrooms but I am depressed enough looking at that figure without adding to it. No wonder I occasionally feel like Eeyore contemplating the meaning of my life. My friend Leisa and I were talking about jobs you don’t get to retire from and this one was at the top of the list. Cooking can be creative. Cleaning the house can leave you feeling good about the way it looks but cleaning toilets has no feel good component to it at all.
Sometimes work can be satisfying, fulfilling, well paid if nothing else. And sometimes, work is just work, necessary but not much reward. Brother Lawrence had a great deal to say about using our work, even the least satisfying work, as a vehicle for praising God. In theory, I appreciate the sentiment but in reality, I have to keep kicking myself as a reminder. All work is not created equal. Somehow most of us find a balance between the necessary evils like toilet cleaning and the work that gives meaning to our lives.
I am the pianist for our little church. On Tuesday we have choir practice for two hours. Sunday mornings, I get to church early so I can get ready for the prelude and arrange my music. This is work. No pay but the satisfaction of being involved in a church music program again. Every morning I muck out the horse and donkey stalls, feed Ferdinand the bull, feed the cats and dogs. Most days I feed the cows and regularly spray them for flies. No pay but the satisfaction of relationships with animals. I am cleaning house this week getting ready for a church picnic at our house this next Sunday. Sprucing up, changing the slipcovers, weeding the flower beds, dusting, picking up and cleaning up. No pay but the satisfaction of extending hospitality to a faith community that is dear to my heart.
An old hymn I used to sing at Pinetta Baptist Church comes to mind. “To the work! To the work! We are servants of God; Let us follow the path that our Master has trod; With the balm of his counsel our strength to renew, Let us do with our might what our hands find to do. Toiling on, toiling on, toiling on, toiling on; Let us hope (and trust) let us watch (and pray) and labor ‘til the Master comes.” Like the Jews in Nehemiah rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, give me a mind to work, Lord, so I might show myself worthy of this gift of life. Keep me moving on, toiling on, singing on my way as I do the work I have been given to do. Thank you for a healthy body that can work. And now, Lord, excuse me, please, while I go scrub toilets.
Sometimes work can be satisfying, fulfilling, well paid if nothing else. And sometimes, work is just work, necessary but not much reward. Brother Lawrence had a great deal to say about using our work, even the least satisfying work, as a vehicle for praising God. In theory, I appreciate the sentiment but in reality, I have to keep kicking myself as a reminder. All work is not created equal. Somehow most of us find a balance between the necessary evils like toilet cleaning and the work that gives meaning to our lives.
I am the pianist for our little church. On Tuesday we have choir practice for two hours. Sunday mornings, I get to church early so I can get ready for the prelude and arrange my music. This is work. No pay but the satisfaction of being involved in a church music program again. Every morning I muck out the horse and donkey stalls, feed Ferdinand the bull, feed the cats and dogs. Most days I feed the cows and regularly spray them for flies. No pay but the satisfaction of relationships with animals. I am cleaning house this week getting ready for a church picnic at our house this next Sunday. Sprucing up, changing the slipcovers, weeding the flower beds, dusting, picking up and cleaning up. No pay but the satisfaction of extending hospitality to a faith community that is dear to my heart.
An old hymn I used to sing at Pinetta Baptist Church comes to mind. “To the work! To the work! We are servants of God; Let us follow the path that our Master has trod; With the balm of his counsel our strength to renew, Let us do with our might what our hands find to do. Toiling on, toiling on, toiling on, toiling on; Let us hope (and trust) let us watch (and pray) and labor ‘til the Master comes.” Like the Jews in Nehemiah rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, give me a mind to work, Lord, so I might show myself worthy of this gift of life. Keep me moving on, toiling on, singing on my way as I do the work I have been given to do. Thank you for a healthy body that can work. And now, Lord, excuse me, please, while I go scrub toilets.
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Down and dirty...
There I stood in my light teal western cut Carrhart shirt with mother of pearl snaps, riding pants and FatBaby pink and brown cowgirl boots, all splashed with wet black muck…
It had been a perfect Saturday. There was a cool breeze all day that broke up the hot humid weather pattern. Still no rain for us so everything is dying… trees, grass, flowers… and the creeks are drying up. I pulled some weeds and finished recovering the wicker sofa’s cushions. After I mucked out the stables, I worked the horses in the riding ring for awhile. Tomato sandwiches for lunch were followed by a nap. Then I rode Dixie and Junie B for two hours, playtime for me but hard work for them.
Michael came and asked for help pumping water for the cows. The small creek that feeds the reservoirs is completely dried up so we need to pump water from the larger creek. It, too, is much smaller now and Michael had a hard time getting enough water dammed up to pump. The cows had knocked over the drain pipe so all the water had drained out of the cistern leaving the fish stranded, gasping in the black muck. I reached in and grabbed him. Holding him in one hand, I drove the Kubota with the other hand and took him to the other reservoir where there was still some water. While Michael set up the pump, I began shoveling the accumulated muck out of the bottom of the reservoir. It was wet and sloppy, splashing in unexpected places. Soon I was heavily decorated with big, black wads of mud. We left the pump running and will need to run it again today to refill the reservoir. Cows drink a lot of water so we will be doing this until we get rain. According to the weather report, none is in sight for this week.
The contrast between the flooding with hurricane Irene and the drought here is striking. To the south and east, there has been rain. But in our small community, the ground is baked hard and is cracking. As always, the paradox of plenty and not enough exist side by side in nature and in our lives. There is no grass to speak of in the pastures. We have been feeding hay for some time, now. The generous rain in the spring meant we had a wonderful first cutting of hay. The drought meant a scarce second cutting and we enter fall and winter hoping we don’t have to buy hay. We will sell our young steers to cut down on the number of mouths we have to feed and hope for a mild winter.
How do we make sense of rain that falls on our neighbor’s farm but not on ours? The age old question of “Why them and not me?” never seems to receive an adequate answer. While I stand with black muck splashed all over me, I remember that rain falls on the just and the unjust alike. I give thanks for pumps and streams and reservoirs and cows, all a part of the wonderful gifts I have been given here at Sabbath Rest Farm. I will live these breezy cool days thanking God in advance for the rain that will come our way replenishing the streams and greening the grass. Even when I am covered in smelly black muck, I am blessed and I know it. Selah.
It had been a perfect Saturday. There was a cool breeze all day that broke up the hot humid weather pattern. Still no rain for us so everything is dying… trees, grass, flowers… and the creeks are drying up. I pulled some weeds and finished recovering the wicker sofa’s cushions. After I mucked out the stables, I worked the horses in the riding ring for awhile. Tomato sandwiches for lunch were followed by a nap. Then I rode Dixie and Junie B for two hours, playtime for me but hard work for them.
Michael came and asked for help pumping water for the cows. The small creek that feeds the reservoirs is completely dried up so we need to pump water from the larger creek. It, too, is much smaller now and Michael had a hard time getting enough water dammed up to pump. The cows had knocked over the drain pipe so all the water had drained out of the cistern leaving the fish stranded, gasping in the black muck. I reached in and grabbed him. Holding him in one hand, I drove the Kubota with the other hand and took him to the other reservoir where there was still some water. While Michael set up the pump, I began shoveling the accumulated muck out of the bottom of the reservoir. It was wet and sloppy, splashing in unexpected places. Soon I was heavily decorated with big, black wads of mud. We left the pump running and will need to run it again today to refill the reservoir. Cows drink a lot of water so we will be doing this until we get rain. According to the weather report, none is in sight for this week.
The contrast between the flooding with hurricane Irene and the drought here is striking. To the south and east, there has been rain. But in our small community, the ground is baked hard and is cracking. As always, the paradox of plenty and not enough exist side by side in nature and in our lives. There is no grass to speak of in the pastures. We have been feeding hay for some time, now. The generous rain in the spring meant we had a wonderful first cutting of hay. The drought meant a scarce second cutting and we enter fall and winter hoping we don’t have to buy hay. We will sell our young steers to cut down on the number of mouths we have to feed and hope for a mild winter.
How do we make sense of rain that falls on our neighbor’s farm but not on ours? The age old question of “Why them and not me?” never seems to receive an adequate answer. While I stand with black muck splashed all over me, I remember that rain falls on the just and the unjust alike. I give thanks for pumps and streams and reservoirs and cows, all a part of the wonderful gifts I have been given here at Sabbath Rest Farm. I will live these breezy cool days thanking God in advance for the rain that will come our way replenishing the streams and greening the grass. Even when I am covered in smelly black muck, I am blessed and I know it. Selah.
Sunday, August 21, 2011
I love Jesus but I drink a little...
Gladys from Austin, Texas, called Ellen Degeneres to let her know she needed to move one of her spiky plants. At certain angles it made Ellen look like Alfalfa, a character with hair that stood up on his crown. Ellen called her back and the eighty eight year old woman was full of herself. She tickled the audience with her conversation. One of her best lines was, “I love Jesus but I drink a little”. Most of us do, I think, love Jesus and drink a little. We mean well, we try hard and we fall short as human beings tend to do.
“The Help”, a novel and now a movie, is full of folks, black and white, who love Jesus and drink a little. The temptation is to judge the Hilly Hypocrites of that world without seeing the Hilly in ourselves. It is so very easy to decipher right from wrong on the big screen fifty years later and miss right from wrong in the here and now. Punitive immigration laws in Alabama and Arizona don’t differ all that much from Jim Crow laws in the fifties. Relationships between the help and the boss ladies in Jackson, Mississippi hinge on the ignorance, the chosen ignorance, of the truth of the help’s lives and selves. And, therein lies the sin.
I listen to people talk about illegal immigrants, about the problems that have come with the wave of Latino workers sweeping across the south and the west. I know the rhetoric is heated and feelings run high. There is a problem with our immigration laws and their enforcement. It isn’t a fair and just system. It never has been. I know most of this latest influx of folks are coming for the same reason my great-grandparents did… a chance at a better life for themselves and their children. It is so very easy to see the Latino woman working at McDonald’s but not really see her, not know her or her story. It is so very easy to generalize… they are taking jobs away from our people, they are not trustworthy, they abuse our welfare system… and indeed some of that is probably true. But there is another side to the story.
One of my chosen sisters employed a young man to help her remodel her grandmother’s house. He was a talented, hardworking young man with a wife and baby, an illegal immigrant who worked hard, paid his taxes and dreamed of life as an American. Caught up in a traffic stop, he was deported to Mexico leaving his young wife and child behind. It was only a matter of months before he was back working hard again, trying to better his life and support his family. Knowing him, knowing his story, makes it hard for me to generalize about illegal immigrants.
I don’t know the best solution to the problems with our illegal immigration. I do know that as Christians who drink a little, we are called to see the face of Christ in all the faces of those who are the least among us. Abilene, one of the maids in “The Help”, taught the little white girl she cared for words to keep in her heart. “I is kind. I is smart. I is important.” In God’s eyes, aren’t we all kind and smart and important? Help me, Lord, to see your face not only in the least of these but also in the faces of those who have more than most, those who proclaim the answers with such certainty, those who look and sound like me.
“The Help”, a novel and now a movie, is full of folks, black and white, who love Jesus and drink a little. The temptation is to judge the Hilly Hypocrites of that world without seeing the Hilly in ourselves. It is so very easy to decipher right from wrong on the big screen fifty years later and miss right from wrong in the here and now. Punitive immigration laws in Alabama and Arizona don’t differ all that much from Jim Crow laws in the fifties. Relationships between the help and the boss ladies in Jackson, Mississippi hinge on the ignorance, the chosen ignorance, of the truth of the help’s lives and selves. And, therein lies the sin.
I listen to people talk about illegal immigrants, about the problems that have come with the wave of Latino workers sweeping across the south and the west. I know the rhetoric is heated and feelings run high. There is a problem with our immigration laws and their enforcement. It isn’t a fair and just system. It never has been. I know most of this latest influx of folks are coming for the same reason my great-grandparents did… a chance at a better life for themselves and their children. It is so very easy to see the Latino woman working at McDonald’s but not really see her, not know her or her story. It is so very easy to generalize… they are taking jobs away from our people, they are not trustworthy, they abuse our welfare system… and indeed some of that is probably true. But there is another side to the story.
One of my chosen sisters employed a young man to help her remodel her grandmother’s house. He was a talented, hardworking young man with a wife and baby, an illegal immigrant who worked hard, paid his taxes and dreamed of life as an American. Caught up in a traffic stop, he was deported to Mexico leaving his young wife and child behind. It was only a matter of months before he was back working hard again, trying to better his life and support his family. Knowing him, knowing his story, makes it hard for me to generalize about illegal immigrants.
I don’t know the best solution to the problems with our illegal immigration. I do know that as Christians who drink a little, we are called to see the face of Christ in all the faces of those who are the least among us. Abilene, one of the maids in “The Help”, taught the little white girl she cared for words to keep in her heart. “I is kind. I is smart. I is important.” In God’s eyes, aren’t we all kind and smart and important? Help me, Lord, to see your face not only in the least of these but also in the faces of those who have more than most, those who proclaim the answers with such certainty, those who look and sound like me.
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