Confession

CONFESSION

When I saw the haunches of the fox hung up in the picket fence, and his stiff body still locked in agonizing struggle, I knew it was my fault.  

I had hidden.  Hidden inside in the air conditioned house instead of going out into the 100 degree day.  If I’d only walked, 15 steps, out of my door, and had looked. I could have saved him.  But comfort cloaked my summer soul in hibernation.

That was 15 years ago and, still, on hot days, scorchers, I wonder who is meeting their demise because I have succumbed to comfort.  It riddles me.  There is probably a diagnosis for this and maybe a pill or two for this overdeveloped sense of guilt I sling around.  I was baptized Catholic, and raised Mid Western Lutheran, so that alone could be its’ own diagnosis, but seriously it is a burden in the heavy heat.  

Today, there are 5 new chicks in the above ground pen we call the duck-ma-hall.  It cost almost as much as a shed to build because my Scandanavian husband builds things to outlive us and our children.  We lovingly tell him that we are all sheltering there during tornado warnings. 

The chicks were a surprise.  The day after we arrived home from vacation, I went to the barns and surveyed.  All was well in stalls 2, 3, 4, and 5, but stall 1 had a black mass in the tube feeder I'd made.  Got the idea off of Pinterest and it worked great with no fatal flaws... for chickens. 

I approached the mass blocking the tube and thought I saw chicken feet, like one had just plunged itself into the tube on a suicide mission.  The room was thick and poorly lit and I had to get too close to the mass to really understand it.  The stench hit my nose and a skeletonized terrorized rodent face emerged as I finally focused. 

Defying visual logic, a squirrel had become trapped inside of the tube.  He must have dove in from the top, swam through the scratch and lodged himself in the bend.  His one tiny paw reached out and his face pointed toward freedom, but I was on vacation.  Comfortably swimming across the lake, sauntering around the lake community, dreaming of which house I'd live in should we win the lottery.  

Grabbing hold of his outstretched paw, I prayed that he would come out in one piece.  He did, but I only knew he was a squirrel by educated guess.  Fluffy gray fur had turned to a disgusting leather and the tail only a trail clinging to maggots.  Mantras helped a bit, "You will not throw up. You will not throw up."  I held my breath and dropped him with some remorse down a ground hog hole.  At least the dogs wouldn't roll in it now.  

Early the next morning my husband and I were both at the barn letting our creatures out.  Stalls 5,4,3,and 2 were clear, but in stall 1 near the tube of death was a black mass on the ground looking complicated. "Not again!" I thought.  I walked in and there lay the hen that had "gone missing" these last 21 days.  She lay awkwardly.  As I stared and sorted out her shape a puff ball moved like a tiny alien through her feathers.  I wondered what was eating her until I came to my senses and registered “chick” and not humongous parasite.  In a reflex defying physics, I scooped it up and then scooped her up.  Several chicks fell from her feathers like giant lice.  My husband and I chased down 5 little ones, then brought mama and littles all to the duck ma-hal.  She clucked excitedly at them showing them how to rummage through straw, then gathered them all to the the shallow water dish for drinks.  

My youngest son woke soon after and I let him know about the return of our mama hen.  He smiled-before 1:00 in the afternoon, and went out to see for himself.  Moments later he's yelling angrily, "Get the incubator!" and "You guys need to check the barn better!" 

In his hands was a gray chick fluffed and peeping, curled tightly into itself unable to bend its stiffened leg or straighten its neck.  My son insisted that warmth woulds fix it.  I cup it in my hand wanting to hope too, but knew that my warm hands hadn't ever performed miracles.  

"Sweetie, this one is not going to make it." 

"Why didn't you check the barn!  Is its' neck broken? Did something hurt it?" 

"There is no blood, and I don't think anything got it.  I really think it just hatched this way and mama probably left it in the nest."  

"We need to get rid of all of the chickens!"

"Because this is too hard?"

"Yes...  Are you going to kill it?"

"Yes, it's best.  I'm sorry." 

He slams the door.

I hold the small soul gently, apologize for its short time in the sun and pray that I would just become teflon.  Let this life slide out Home and not stick to my soul.  In what seems like forever, the small soul goes limp in my warm hands as I hold it under water and pray for its peace.  I bury the small creature and go in to hug my boy.  He jerks away angrily, "You have dead chick on you." 


It's true.

I have this dead chick on me, and a dead fox, and some cows, and my sweet dog Hannah, and a squirrel, and countless chickens and a goat.  



It's no wonder I've gained weight with all of these souls I carry around.

Hannah a day before she went Home

This Mama hen and all of her chicks lost to a fox

only 2 goats now, Willow is gone

Light Disguised as Darkness

Light Disguised as Darkness

There's a text from my Husband. "Research shows that Ravens are just as smart as chimpanzees."  

"I knew it,"  I hear myself whisper, and I am hurtled back 3 or 4 years ago to a Spring day like today just glistening with potential, sitting next to my son in the cab of our red truck.  He seemed intent on bursting every happiness of the day, and I told myself that he didn't want to suck the life out of me.  It's depression and anxiety that has him suspended in a vortex but no matter what I do or say or pray, it was not subsiding.  

We both sat helpless and isolated together in that truck.  If I could get him to move, just move, do a jumping jack, run 10 steps, dance a jig, anything, then maybe we could build on that, but his answer was always a grunted "no".  He had gotten too big for me to carry physically, and I  couldn't admit it but he was too big for me emotionally as well.  My fierce protective Mother love was the only thing keeping us from ruin, that and an intervention of sorts.
We sat in the driveway silently at war.  "Please walk the trash can up the driveway and to the house." I had asked/told him in my most positive "hey, we are a normal family voice."  He said nothing.  "We are all a part of this family, we all have jobs, we help each other out.  Please take the empty trash can to the house."  He gave his short grunting answer "no".  

I wanted to spank him.  I grew up being spanked and it worked for me. I never felt abused, I simply knew I had crossed a line and there were consequences.  Yes, I spanked both my children only for blatant disobedience and for running into traffic. It worked for one - Not this one.  Spanking was not an effective option, although at this point I began fantasizing about shock therapy because there had to be a solution that could jolt him to life!!! 

I had seen him alive on the rare good day that we had.  I called those days moments of brilliance.  Those were days when he spoke to me like real people did.  He asked questions and cared about the answers, and sometimes he'd even tell me about an idea he'd had.  So I  knew HE. WAS. IN. THERE!  How to get him out was the question that had spread to 2/3 of my brain.

I was about to yell, lose my cool, let the ginormous beast of my frustration out, scare the son I ached for right out of the thickening soup his soul was swimming in, when he said words.  

"Mom, what is that?" 

"What are you seeing?"  I asked.  

"That!" He pointed angrily.  

I couldn't see what he was pointing at, so I asked him to show me. 

We both exited the cab into fresher air and he walked up the driveway slowly.   I followed behind.  There on the corner post of our ranch fence was a black bird.  Crow, I  thought, but then getting closer saw that this was a crow on serious growth hormone.  

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His brilliant feathers shone like obsidian.  His darkness seemed to simply be a cutout in all of the light filled Spring day.  He saw us and flapped his wings half half-heartedly, then jumped onto the ground near the fence.  

"He's hurt," my son anxiously stated.  

"He doesn't look hurt.  He's so shiny and perfect, and look at those eyes.  They look happy." I said back.

The Raven began hopping slowly away from us.  We stopped, not wanting to scare him off.  Then he turned to look at us and hopped toward us like he was egging us on.  We walked toward him.  He hopped deliberately away and again turned to took at us.  By this time we were both talking to this amazing creature and following him. 

He hopped all the way to the house, then up to the roof all the while eyeing us to make sure we were travelling with him. This creature, this feathered answer to prayer was playing with us!

My son dashed (yes, dashed) into the house to get a few slices of bread.   He offered up the bread, but the Raven moved to the other side of the roof.  We went to the other side of the roof and tried to throw the bread to him.  It was too light weight, and the bread ended up in the grass as did the two of us.  We finally just sat in the grass together barely speaking, just watching this creature who chose to engage us, chose to draw us in, chose to draw us out.  The Raven hopped back and forth between the pitched angles of our roof and finally let out a "Caw!" then flew low and away showing off his substantial wingspan and the strength of his flight.  

After a long silence, Alex said, "Mom, I'm going to go get the trash can."  

NEW GROWTH

He left and I wept until I was empty of grief and filled with thanksgiving for this black space that flew in and saved our Spring day.  Yes, Ravens are smart.

PS.  Since the intervention by Raven, my son has been diagnosed with high functioning Autism.  He is also on medications for depression and anxiety that are better suited to him than the ones he took a few years ago.  He has many more days of brilliance and we are not as overwhelmed as we once were.  We are thankful!

Training Pants

TRAINING PANTS

He drove himself to school today.  I stayed at home…praying.  

Before his voice got low and mumbly and aberrant hairs started appearing like that one really long hair growing under his chin (I swear I will cut this hair off of while he's sleeping) encouragement and celebrations came easily.  Back then we could be honest and gleeful and proclaim victories like toilet training, training wheels off, and the wheels in his mind churning out epiphanies.

Do you remember training pants?  Extra padding for oops moments?  They were insurance against a truly crappy day!  Car insurance doesn't allow for “oops” moments despite the fabled accident forgiveness that is being sold.  There are additional consequences to the original penalty of paying the outrageous amount required for a beginning driver.  Our insurance went up $678 for 6 months and no, this is not a typo!  I guiltily miss training pants and training wheels. Why guilt?  Because he is free, and who am I to hold back a nest- jumper?

Today, the celebration is bottled in a recyclable bottle labeled "fear and lack of parental control” and “Mom, you are embarrassing me!"  He's fledging. Oh Dear God, let the missteps come with inconsequential bruising.  Let the lessons be deep, but spare him of piercing trauma.  I pray, “Bandaids, God, not gauze wads” as if God is a pharmacist who takes orders!

He was excited.  I could tell because he didn't scowl at me and hugged me willingly before he left home, his keys jingling from a lanyard.  On a typical morning he says nothing to me.  I say very little to him to abide by the rules of non-stimulation listed in the manual on how to raise a teen.  What, you didn’t get a manual?   I played my part well offering short sentences and stifled advice, "don't rush, be safe, I love you."  He mumbled "love you" as if he was merely clearing mashed potatoes from his palate and not confessing his allegiance to the woman who bore him and cleaned up all manner of bodily functions for the past 17 years.

I didn't watch the car pull out, because this was a time for faith not sight.  Prayers flowed from the top of my head like some hairy Repunzel cloud swirling around and the words were not eloquent, but "caveman like," "safe boy, yay! free!, help, your will, oh God, training pants, big boy now, wow!"

My baby boy is 17, potty trained, and driving.  My work here is finished! Ha!

PREPPING…

The parking lot is full and this old man comes shuffling out of the store with a lanky teen walking next to him.  Our town is filled with cold purpose.  Everyone is gearing up and battening down, ensuring they have enough essentials to survive the impending storm.  Two feet of snow and howling winds, the media has peered into it’s crystal ball and shouted "Blizzard! The end is near!"

Shelves at the Walmart are bare of bread and minus milk. The toilet paper isle is spare with perhaps no square to spare.  I sit in the truck, watching people, surmising what they deem essential for survival as my husband waits in line to purchase feed for our chickens, goats and sheep. 

I'm too vain to leave the truck when I still have my pajama flannels on underneath the dark brown Carhart coveralls and coat that I affectionately call the turd suit (because that is how I look). 

The old man shuffles towards his truck.  The teen is patient with his friend’s effort.  Their snail-like cart is obviously loaded to capacity, but I can’t see the contents.   I only see the inching of their torsos above the hoods of parked cars.

It seems most of town is wearing camo and hats.  Are we all going hunting?  Elmer Fudd comes to mind and now I'm involuntarily humming "kill the wabbit, kill the wabbit".  

 I look into the carts of strangers and gather clues about who these people are by the contents.  What is essential?  

One ample woman in a tired, limp coat and matching fur lined hat gets into an ancient mercedes.  She looks like she hasn’t showered in a while, and yet she is wearing a skirt and has nylons on.  Nylons are an effort!!  Kudos lady!  She throws her bagged purchase haphazardly into the back seat, then opens the driver side door, points her backside towards the seat and lets her entire mass give over to gravity as she flops down onto that seat.  She then pivots her suspended barely covered legs into the car and slams the door shut.  

This is when I see that the window is covered in yellowed tattered plastic.  It's possible that she is on her own, and my stomach knots uncomfortably because she is unreachable.  One old woman in a beat up car going who knows where, and it’s not wise to knock on her thin holey window to ask,"Are you alone?  Do you need help in this storm?”  I watch her drive away and wonder how cold it must be to drive with a partially exposed window while wearing a skirt and nylons.

Praying feels like a copout, but I pray for her anyway, that someone who is close can reach out and provide assistance or at least get some new plastic on that window, and maybe bring her some warm socks or a coat that hasn't lost all of its stuffing.

The old shuffling man and his teen load the back of his rusted sun faded green pickup.  The cab shakes as each load is dropped.  The engine sputters, then pushes white smoke from the tail pipe.  He puts it creakily into gear, pulls forward passed me, and I nosily peek into the truck bed to see what brought him here to put forth so much effort right before a blizzard.  

The truck bed was filled with at least 8 large bags.  My first thought was cows.  Cows might need 8 bags of feed during the 3 days we were predicted to be snowbound.  But then I scanned a bag and saw pictures of birds and sunflowers. Instantly this wave of awe overcame me.  Birdseed was his essential thing.  Not bread and milk and toilet paper but birdseed.  The least of these, he's taking care of the least of these.  Creatures who don’t belong to anyone are his priority. 

No news anchor will interview him and point out this extreme kindness. The shortage of bread, milk, and bottled water is the newsworthy footage.  Not many will know of the goodness of this aged man and his helpful teen.  The birds will know.  I know.  Now you know. 

There is kindness.  Maybe it takes nosiness to find it.  

Hum it with me.  "Feed the birds. Tuppence a bag."

WAIT

The belated Christmas Confession. It was all the Chickens’ fault.

Starlings fly over me.  A flock flittering right over me, and I feel them. 

No really,

I could feel the very life of them.  They circle back as if they sense my doubt and prove it again.  Head to toe, I feel them all, electric and humming. 

One dandelion pushes up stumpy in the December grass, smiling through this season's attempt at winter.  Me in short sleeves, arms bare to the feathering of a gentle wind, and it's Dec 12th. 

I wait for the teenaged chickens to finally go to bed.  They are as unwilling as human teens, circling the barn door then following a new whim. Defying the creeping darknes.  Rebellious.  Plain rebellious, and I love them like my exhales depend on their soft clucking. 

On inhales I pray that God protect them from stupidity.  The same deep call I repeat for human teens.  The same prayer encoded in some base pair twisting in the nuclei of each beings' cells.

Unmoving, I soak up this 10 minutes of non-rushing, non-flapping and non-flittering. Entirely glad for the inconvenience of waiting for birds to tidily go to bed. 

The skies fall darker each minute, pressing the chicks toward the door.  Finally they flow in, and the waiting is sadly over. Busy-ness once again presses hard.  Close the door, fill the feeders, check the water, and walk briskly back to the house where chores have surely multiplied in my absence. 

Christmas seems to have turned into a feat of plate spinning by a naughty cat in the hat. “No I do not like this not one little bit.” Yet, I am trapped in the going, doing, buying, and selling of my soul. Trapped by a seasonal job at a call center where selling to the desperate-busy seems like taking advantage.  Like selling snake oil. Like promising them a sacred Christmas space walled in by purchased items made cheaply in far away factories. 

I count the advent days today, but not in anticipation of celebrating the birthing of God who came to save us, came to get us, came to love us out of our traps. No, as if to prove that He came for a wretch like me, I count the days until it’s OVER!

I wait for the days when it's all simplified and tidy.  

Maybe I am hoping for the right thing.  Maybe I know deeply that only He can give me the gifts I need like flocks of birds to soothe or chickens come to keep me still and silent and peacefilled.  Maybe that's just Him come to save me.  

That’s what Jesus translates to, “God Saves.”  And I would add "Me" to that.  He saves Me from walls made of plastic and leads me to the "real" electricity of creatures and the hum of clucking and the presence of this electric current in Everyone.  

Ann Voskamp (www.aholyexperience.com) writes that Peace is not a place, peace is a person.  We sing of Jesus, prince of peace, and I want peace, am hungry-desperate for peace.  There is peace in chickens and flocks and women and men desperate for the right gift. 

If you can stare into space a bit and breathe with intention and let your other senses loose, it might be clearer.  It might come as a gift, wrapped or not, being so weighted in the present.

Now, He is here for me, and He is coming for me, and He is peace in each exhale and flap of chaos. THIS Peace loves us. 

I feel it!  

A PAUSE

A PAUSE

There has been a pause in this blog, but certainly not a pause in writing. 

I have written long and unpublishable things, rants really - spoiled child dissertations about rights and unfairness and love and letting go.  When sorting out is hard, you don’t go public.  You wait until chaff is blowing towards the trees and you’ve cleaned up a little, cleared your throat, and washed your face. 



CHRISTMAS CARDS

When my youngest son was 9, in the middle of the Christmas rush, he left our kitchen filled with the soft hum of Christmas music, and quietly walked outside.  When I couldn't find him I panicked.  When I found him and heard him, the panic was just beginning.  He had locked himself inside of our minivan and wailed to me he wouldn’t come out because he hated his life and wanted to die, specifically freeze to death.  Of course, I easily extracted him from the van (I had keys), but it would be years before the sorting out of depression, anxiety and autism was in a state where we could address it, talk about it, understand it, live peaceably next to it and stop blaming “it” for taking our son’s intended life from us.

The outgoing Christmas cards never went out that year.  Then, like now, too much sorting out.  The outgoing Christmas cards haven’t made it out since, but not so with this blog.  Thankfully, this sorting is a fraction less complex.

TRANSITION
The current sorting started last Summer a little before the Wholesaler I sold produce to folded their business up into a tidy chain of words: "we will be closing as of September 11th."  Slightly before that my very level headed and loving husband announced that he didn't want the farm any longer.  He wanted to get rid of the animals, sell it all off and live like “normal” people do.  

a Storm Approaches

So I gasped for air.  Over and over.  Gasping and grasping sorting out the tug of war.  Not even sure what the prize was should I win.  If we stay, then he is unhappy which ultimately makes me unhappy.  If we go, everything about who I am is stripped down and I will have to spend my days clean and dressed appropriately, smelling like the “normal” people. 

A TRUCE  
He conceded that we could stay until the youngest son graduated, if I would agree that there would be no additional animals to the farm.  We agreed to stop farming by attrition.  In the hopeful corner of my mind, we get to stay here, but outwardly I am lobbying for buying a 5 acre lot and building a “farmette” so we can keep the animals we have until they die, but live in a lower maintenance house.  If that should ever come to fruition, I plan to lobby for only 3 chickens and 2 dairy goats. It's my 5 year plan, and my tenacious mate is prepared for the battle.  After 24 years of marriage, the man knows me and the hopes I harbor.  He absolutely doesn't want to build a house and wants to live on a lake or river.  Negotiations continue….

This is Whisper's Negotiation Face

THERE IS PEACE

I'm not angry anymore.  Truly, this life of dirt and eggs and fruit and vegetable production is no longer sustainable.  It takes 2 people to build any kind of family life and if one person is unfulfilled, then the whole schmear is unsustainable.  A farm needs at least 2 and maybe 10 people who are invested up to their armpits in order to thrive.

Rose Hips drying

Making Grape Juice

Neck Pumpkins for Pumpkin Pie
Enough for an Army really! 

Roasting Tomatoes for Sauce

THANKFULNESS 

Each day, the rising and setting sun, is so new as if I see it for both the first and the last time.  Each day, I ready this place for the eventual real estate sign at the end of the driveway and our journey to a sustainable life.  Each day I count the crows, moos, and baas and mehs and store them in the corners and folds of my mind.  I hear the opening line of "Out of Africa".  That breathy exhilirating whisper, "I had a farm in Africa."  “I have a farm in Virginia” continues to fill my soul.

The Fab Five Teenage Chicks Check Out the New Windows

Replacing the Old Broken Windows With Old Unbroken Windows

Residing the Barn, Step 1: Tear down

My Sweet Husband

LUCKY

All in all, I am living "the dream", and fixing up this old place for sale is part of it.  Someone else will get to make a fresh start of it.  I imagine a young couple with ambition and strength building upon the foundation we laid just as we built on the foundation that the Hills, the originators of this farm laid.  I had hoped to grow old here, maybe die in the same bedroom that Mrs. Hill died in, roam the house as a ghost like Mr. and Mrs. Hill do, and bounce blessings off of the walls like their gentle apparitions continue to do.  But perhaps, that is someone else's destiny, and mine is to figure out how to become civilized again.

UNTIL
Until then,

I will grow

and harvest

and cry

and laugh

and dress funny

and smell like dirt and manure

and pound nails

and prepare for something a little more mainstream and maybe a little easier on my bones and heart. 

And I will love my husband for his honesty, and for the gift of these 13 years here and the gift of having my dearest friend as my partner these 26 years.  Above all, I will remain steadfastly thankful for every favor God showers on my expectant heart. 

Goodness!

Passion Flower (May Pop)

Palms up to Catch Every Good and Perfect Gift