A New Season

March 9^th: I slay thee poplar and return thy sage and pale yellow meat from whence it came: ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Thus spoke … me. At a quarter to 6 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, the splitting axe found the last two hearts of timber, the last to be chopped for this winter.

Choppin’ wood has become a topic of conversation with a few members of our church, and a kind man brought it up in the narthex after the service of worship this past Sunday. He asked me if I was still burning. I told him I was, but the end was near. It was then I, the pastor, made my own confession: “You know, I thought this wood burning stuff was pretty manly in December. But … by the time February rolled around, I was done with being manly.” Once again, I managed to say something that I would never say if I actually possessed forethought. Thankfully, my friend laughed with me, not at me.

I am not the only one ready to disavow myself from winter and its chores. Spring is flirting with our long-buried hopes, and is wooing us with fairer days. This past Friday temperatures reached into the 50’s, and it was its own kind of intoxication. It just so happened that the sublime day was also the day we had committed to being outside and doing work.

Early in the morning, Gramma Lis came by to deliver a heaping bowl of steel-cut oats to our table. We sat mixing berries and syrup into our own bowls, talking and trying to determine what was to be done, who would watch the children, and what we would eat for lunch. Confusion was beginning to sprout, at which point Gramma Lis insisted on taking the kids into town and freeing us to do some work. We were freed by a sacrifice.

Without the responsibility of caring for our children, Anna and I hopped in the truck and in a few minutes we were on Manhattan Road. The chicks are soon to arrive, and we were in search of two necessities: chicken feed and sawdust. After a few calls to grain mill operators, Anna discovered that while Greencastle’s feed store does not carry any natural chicken feed, Cloverdale’s mill does. So it was Anna and I parked our petite 4x4 truck amidst a row of F-250’s and Silverado’s in the chalky gravel lot, and walked into the store looking exactly like what we are: ignorant, eager and overwhelmed. But, despite our foolish searching for chicken feed amidst cat, dog and bird food, we were soon wise enough to consult a man who clearly could help – he decked in Carhartt® overalls and a hat the color of a John Deere tractor and emblazoned with the sort of agri-business logo that stand guard over Indiana bean and corn fields. It wasn’t long after that I was throwing a 50lb bag of Homestead Poultry Developer into the bed of the truck. Do you think me a fool to say I was thrilled … or proud?

It was mid-morning when we returned back home. Still released from parenting, Anna and I stepped out into the yard. I carried a bow saw and pruning shears in opposite hands and headed towards the fruit trees that line a grassy drive between our garden and the eastern field. Anna carried a ladder and a lopper towards the street. For the next two hours we pruned and trimmed bushes and trees – breaking for lunch and then beginning again, this time with Wyatt and Elise playing in the yard and Gramma Lis joining the work.

To me there is such sweet satisfaction in honest labor; it was pure joy to feel an ache in my shoulders as I sawed the tops of the undisciplined and unruly fruit trees – a reminder again of connections so often severed, the vital connections: God, creation, being human.

By grace we now have many opportunities to rebuild and maintain those connections – a work decreed by God, our given discipline in the wide field of grace, mercy and perseverance. It won’t be long for the tiller to be put into action, the hoe to break the ground, the back to bend in the picking of weeds. And, likely, it won’t be long before the thrill of working the land lessens and the drudgery of the work wears me down – like the chopping of wood lost its manliness. Even still, for that first day, there was pleasure in it. Standing in the top of a pear tree, listening to the doves chortling in the near woods and watching Wyatt and Elise chase after each other, I believed that I too could be a farmer, that I could husband the land faithfully.

~Wes