Humbled Again, and Stronger For It

Author’s note and invitation: If this is your first time here, and you’re wondering about the blog’s name, let me point you to the inaugural post, November 8, 2017, “Checking In”. It explains the title, at least. I also encourage you to keep reading posts two and three, “What We Were Thinking” parts I & II. They’ll give you a broader and bit deeper context into this writing venture of mine, and hopefully answer some additional questions. No matter where you dive in, though, I’m grateful you’re here. Thanks for reading!

Ok, so maybe it was referring to meteorologists as “weather-guessers”, or expressing a desire to be present at the beginning of a predicted wind storm with estimates of 58mph gusts. Or, if you believe such things, the absence of inconvenience for so long that brought that black walnut down during last weekend’s epic wind storm, missing our bridge by inches, and the upper branches of what we thought was a perfectly healthy tree (always more going on below the surface, or in this case, beneath the bark) bouncing just enough on the power lines above to send a domino wobble to the drop line attached to the house. At 3:30a.m. on February 25, that drop line was ripped away, brackets and all, and the LED emergency lights in the kitchen flashed on and stayed, as they’re designed to do. I was downstairs at the time, so carefully raced upstairs to awaken Patrick, who was already reporting the outage to the electric co-op that minds our power (damn, his paramedic training serves him well, doesn’t it?). He had things well in hand, so I went back downstairs and pulled one of those LED lights from the outlet. I opened the front door, shining a dim light on the power lines that now dipped across the front lawn. Too dark to see the rest of the story, I was hopeful we’d see the bright lights of a power crew truck making its way down the driveway in time for me to call in only a little late to work.

I was all poetic last week, inviting you to go outside and wrap yourselves around a tree to feel the power of that wind, and while I make no apologies for that, I sense that I may have invited the contrast that left us without power or heat for nearly twelve hours, hunching beneath layers of clothing and blankets as we waited patiently for the crews to show up and make it all better. When dawn arrived, the scene near the front porch presented another dramatic twist: the power lines had landed on our trucks. And while we didn’t see or hear any crackling or sparks, neither of us felt like playing the curious “hero” who would later be eulogized as a mostly smart person who moved to the country nearly twenty years ago to live a different kind of life. Me and my big mouth (or hand, in this case, as my words were written for all to see, and refer back to, maybe).

We’ve gone without power here before. In January 2000, we traveled to visit friends in Mexico, entrusting the care of our home to a friend who had modest handyman skills. We arrived home to find water in the basement, as high at the top step, which meant our furnace had now seen better days. He swore he didn’t hear anything, but did confess to wondering where the water pressure went as he tried to do a load of laundry. We stayed with friends nearby for two weeks until both plumbing and furnace could we repaired and replaced, respectively.

Then there was the Great Ice Storm of 2004, which coated everything in a dazzling couple three inches of the stuff, snapping the roof of our old old goat barn as the pregnant does gave birth at both ends of the semi-collapsed structure. We made do in the house with a couple of kerosene heaters, atop which I’d put a pan of water and some oats, to feel like I could still cook. We had a wood burner at the time, and a futon in the living room, so closed off the adjoining downstairs rooms and pretended we were newlyweds on an extended cabin-in-the-woods honeymoon (except I’d just had ear surgery and was deaf on one side for about six weeks, and Patrick was working at the local hospital, bringing home once-warm food from their cafeteria in carryout containers. Not quite the romantic atmosphere of our first legitimate honeymoon, but we look back now with the same stars in our eyes, which is rather sweet). We spent Christmas Eve stoking the fire and trying to toast squares of mochi on the grill of the kerosene heater. I don’t recommend it.

THEN, there was the derecho of June 2012, and I was on my own for that one. Patrick was in South Dakota visiting with family while I stayed in Ohio, working and tending to the animals we had (chickens, or course, rabbits, and possibly some turkeys. I can’t remember). It was the week of our annual Kids’ Grief Camp at work, the last day, and after debriefing at a local restaurant with some beverages, I had stopped at the hardware store to buy a couple of live traps to catch whatever or whoever had taken out the whole of our laying flock the night before. Said traps now safely stowed in the back of my truck, I stopped to chat with our neighbor Sherry, with whom we share a driveway and love of chickens, about the tragic loss, and how hard it is to keep the girls safe sometimes. We noticed the gathering clouds above us, but there was nothing alarming about what we presumed would be a brief summer downpour. Still, we each had things to do, and so we wrapped up our musings and I continued down the gravel driveway. Not twenty minutes later, I was hunkered down in the bathtub with a thick towel over my head, clutching my flip cell phone in one hand as gale-force winds plastered leaves against the west side of the house and sideways rain hit the siding like a barrage of bullets. I got out of the tub to look out the living room windows just in time to see lightning strike the thorny honeylocust on the ridge, splitting it in two. Back to the bathtub I went, phone still clutched in my hand. Four days of 100+-degree temps later, the lights were back on, and our large upright freezer had never been so clean. Or so empty.

So. We’ve done this no-power thing before. Twelve hours without heat wasn’t going to bring us to despair, but…the sight of power lines holding our transportation hostage did elevate the drama, and the wind was still blowing as fiercely as ever, making a sort of jump rope game of things, slapping into the sides of the trucks and then landing just inches away on the ground. After a responsible second call to the power company to ask them what they thought (would it be ok if we tried to move one of the trucks if the line wasn’t actually touching it? Please??), Patrick took advantage of a line-on-the-ground moment and moved his truck all the way to a nearby farm supply store where he bought a new kerosene heater. Once that was up and running, the temperature in the living room climbed from 49 to 53 balmy degrees. I could take off the scarf I was wearing.

It all ended well, of course. The power crew arrived just before sunset, pulled the line back up into place, and set off to relieve the next poor unfortunate soul with perhaps less blankets than we had. I showered while Patrick make huevos rancheros and paprika roasted potatoes. The chef at the Ritz couldn’t have made me happier.

My thinking is not so magical to convince me that a careless moniker written to tease a chuckle from my readers was enough to rip a drop line from the house and put a new heat source in my living room. But the whole adventure, like the ones before it, did adjust my posture to a more humble one, and reminded me that my perspective dangles precariously at times between the hard rock of reality and the tender elastic roots of poetic interpretation. I willingly walk into the balance of those two, and pray I stand a bit straighter because of their lessons.

As I write this, we’re under a winter weather advisory until 1:00a.m. Monday morning. Hazardous road conditions, one to two inches of snow.

I’m not saying a word.

On Wind, and Trees, and a Friend Named Evelyn

The weather-guessers predicted heavy winds to begin at 4:00a.m., so on my first trip to the bathroom before dawn (there are usually at least three), I opened the front door to stillness and a couple of blurry stars beneath wispy veils of cloud cover. Maybe they meant 4:30a.m. But I’ll be asleep again by then. So I crawled back into bed, and the next time I opened my eyes, the sun was about two hands above the field line, and the trees had clearly been waving their branchy arms for a few hours now (they looked well into it with no signs of stopping). I put on my farm chore clothes and got to work.

I’ve always wanted to experience the moment when the winds pick up during the night. I’ve had the privilege many times to stand on our deck in daylight and face the gathering clouds to the west, watching as the limbs of the blue spruce and yellow maples along the ridge received the rolling unfolding of a good thunderstorm. It’s the most gorgeous of dances—long branches waving back and forth as thick trunks stand firmly planted in the ground. I look for the place where the trunk itself begins to sway, and it’s about one-third of the way up.

But at night, when such details are shrouded in darkness, I’ve only been shaken awake by the bang of our metal roof, never on the porch listening to the breeze become a howling crescendo of fully-engaged atmospheric rapturous symphony. In such a moment, I’d have to rely on my ears to capture and interpret the meaning of whistles and howls, my hair and skin to register the fierceness of a gust, while my eyes, sans glasses, squint through a muted ombre of grays that gives only hints of the shapes around me—the stand of young mulberry saplings just off the front deck, the bricks that form a circle around the hollowed out standing stump of the dead apple tree, the outline of our two trucks parked on the slanted driveway. All of it is familiar in my memory but indistinct at 4:00a.m. I’m grateful for the extra hours of sleep, of course, and look forward the next cold front that brings such a wild gift in its hands for my other senses to enjoy.

On a somewhat related topic, have you ever wrapped your arms around the trunk of a tree during strong winds? Rather a personal question, I know. But if you can, please try it today before the winds die down. It won’t necessarily make you a Tree Hugger (not that there’s anything wrong with that), but the sensation of swaying along with something whose roots are embedded way below one’s unattached feet is simply unforgettable. And a bit dizzying. I recommend selecting a tree big enough to catch the wind and distribute that movement throughout its lanky frame, but not so large that your fingertips can’t touch when you reach your arms around the rough bark. It also helps to press your torso and legs into the trunk of the tree, like the squirrels do when they’re resting mid-climb on their way to the nest at the top. And finally, close your eyes. I accept that I may have taken our relationship to a new and unexpected level. I appreciate your patience and open-mindedness (and, I want to hear how this goes for you. Please comment here at this post, or via the contact page on this blog).

Those same weather-guessers have announced a High Wind Warning, to “remain in effect until 10:00p.m. EST this evening” (guess where I’ll be at 10:01?), “with winds out of the west 25 - 35mph, and gusts up to 58mph.” I have no way to confirm the accuracy of that windspeed prediction, but if we have hatches to batten down, they have indeed been battened. The rabbit hutches are wrapped in blue tarps that are now flapping and snapping in the wind (do rabbits need earplugs? I wonder…), which is testing the strength of the bungee cords I bought at a local dollar store. I’ll check them again, long before 10:00p.m., and more than once. In the meantime, I’ve decided to work on a couple of inside projects: hauling some old bookshelves from the attic and setting them up the studio/downstairs guestroom where I’ll reorganize and store my art supplies. That should take me through lunch and just before dinner. And then I’ll make a few books.

A friend of mine, Evelyn, showed me the art and craft of bookbinding shortly after my father passed away. His death took the creative wind out of me for a couple of years. Let me just say how rare that was, to not put my hands to any sort of artistic pursuit for that long a time. Art quilts were my thing for over a decade, and I dabbled in painting and other projects that required the occasional use of a glue gun. But when dad died, so did the motivation and curiosity. Until Evelyn came out to the farm for lunch, and brought her tote bags full of book board, PVA glue, waxed thread, jute, and a handmade cradle for punching holes in the creases of the signatures that would become pages. In between bites of chicken salad and raspberries, and by the end of the weekend long after Evelyn left for home, I made twelve blank journals and never looked back. I think I heard dad cheering…

While the wind rearranges the landscape and the trees dance on the other side of the living room windows, it’s satisfying to be about my own windless rearranging inside, following a gentle muse wherever it leads me, and making note of the relationship between the Creations outside and the creative impulse that ripples and stirs within each of us. There are lessons only a windy day can teach us.

By 10:00 o’clock tonight, I wonder what will look different…on both sides of the living room windows.

Now, go hug that tree and let me know what you think.

Where The Worlds Meet

I have a new plush throw, 50” x 70”, with whimsical kitties frolicking all over it, pattern-wise. It’s brightness caught my eye at a rare “pay-full-price” retail experience after work last week, and I wasn’t surprised at all that it came home with me. It’s washed and currently spread out like fluffy royalty on the bed. The living cats who own us have been schooled: not one black hair is to be found on this one. We’ll see how long that lasts (sigh…).

In the wake of Valentine’s Day, I am still trying to make good on the self-promise to send little dried lavender-filled heart-shaped sachets to people we know and love. Years back, I bought a red tin full of die-cut fabric hearts, all pink or magenta or faded rose, with the intention of making a pretty large applique quilt for our bed. With that quilt still a dream on my pillow (sheesh, I didn’t even sketch out the design like I usually do, on 1/4” graph paper that Patrick often borrows for his woodworking projects), I dug into this colorful stash, matched the random pattern samples, and stitched pairs of hearts together, leaving a small opening so I could spoon in the lavender flowers. That’s what I did most of the day yesterday. A day sewing, sitting on the couch, getting up once in a while for water and snacks. As rare as my paying full retail for anything. It was delicious and slovenly all in one moment.

But when I woke up today, the voice that calls me to the walking paths was clear, loud, and urgent. And the sunrise, with its pink and gray stripes against a glowing blue horizon, beckoned gently as I quietly hurried to put on my boots and layer up against a chilly wind. After a few distractions (fixing the fence on the north side of the chicken run, where clearly they had stood on each other’s shoulders and pushed against it until it gave way, squawking gleefully at their effort and newfound freedom; then, refilling the birdfeeders while the blue jays told me to work faster), I kept to my normal route, starting from behind the house down the path past the sweat lodge to the corner Where The Worlds Meet, then taking a left toward the western edge of the property fence and a sharp right up the Hill. By this time, my nose was running, and I knew I’d be washing my thick fleece gloves when I returned to the mudroom/laundry room. I didn’t mind. It felt as if I’d been gone from this path for a lifetime. Work and after-work tiredness, plus some below-zero wind chill days kept us both inside the past couple of weeks, save for the essential outdoor tasks of feeding and watering animals. Things change every day here, but I’m not out in all of it every day, so I miss things, and then have to rely on my memory to bridge the gap between what I saw on the last walk and what the fields and woods are showing me today. A great anti-Alzheimer’s plan if ever there was one. So far, it seems to be working.

I want to pause for a moment here and go on a bit about that spot Where The Worlds Meet. That’s what we call it here, but it could refer to any place in the wild where an open field meets a tree line. I’ve been told, and have tested it enough to feel comfortable saying it’s true, that these places see the most animal activity. If you’re patient and willing, you can sit there and watch how the birds congregate in the trees whose branches reach out across the spot where the woods end and the field begins. You’ll find deer tracks, evidence of raccoons and foxes and the elusive coyote. There must be something about what these spaces offer to our wild relatives—food, shelter and protection, hiding places, and whatever a fox might dream of as she travels the land. When we cut the first path through the field and around the edge of the meadow woods, we paid close attention to how we carved something so human in the midst of what had been theirs since the beginning of time, and we gave thanks for their tolerance. It immediately became a favorite place, this particular corner on the land, where we’d stop in our tracks and just look about in wonder and amazement at all that it represented. We wondered how many souls had traversed it’s grass-covered loam. One year, Patrick surprised me on our “the day we first met” anniversary (August 11, 1992, at precisely 8:38p.m.), with an al fresco dinner served on a folding table placed carefully at that corner. Tablecloth, napkins, and a resplendent feast from Bob Evans—Wildfire Chicken salad, rolls, mashed potatoes, and strawberry pie, while we talked into the sunset, remembering first impressions and the sacredness of that life-changing moment for each of us. “Where The Worlds Meet” indeed…

So back to my runny nose and this chilly walk, where I look hard and close for changes in the landscape, eventually giving into what every good land walk does—pulls me into its here-and-now magic, shows me just how hard the wind was blowing two nights ago (tree limbs everywhere, some less sturdy black walnuts snapped in two and cradled in the stronger arms of the buckeyes that caught them as they fell), and where they deer had been. I love finding this stuff, this evidence that we’re not alone here. And, as usually happens on a cold day, I begin to feel sleepy and imagine myself just curling up on the ground, nestled in a thick patch of fallen sycamore leaves, drifting into a dreamless slumber and waking up somewhere else. I’ve not tried this yet, but…it sure is tempting this morning. I think I’m dressed warmly enough, but not brave enough to test it. So I keep walking.

Waiting for me back at the house is a sink full of last night’s dishes, what’s left of the rustic loaf of bread I baked last night, and blueberries in the freezer that will find their way on top of my morning oatmeal. While that colorful kitties plush throw is still keeping Patrick warm as he sleeps, I’m grateful that I subscribe to the philosophy that no one in my home during winter should be more than two feet away from a quilt or blanket. I’ll take off enough layers to be comfortable indoors now, gather my breakfast things and settle onto the couch for vitamins and reflection. The walk stays with me, lingering on the edges of a busy mind and a full heart. I hold on as long as I possibly can.

Being. Friends.

The eastern sky is a solid wall of pinkish-orange, verging on that only-at-sunrise red, and the clouds make a fish scale sort of herringbone pattern. If I was a sailor, I’d be taking warning.

Rabbits are fed and watered (including our free-range skipper, Oscar, who gambols about the back yard, pushing snow aside to get at the tough grass below), last night’s dinner dishes are drying in the drainer, and my mug of green tea is warm but not too hot, safe now to drink without scalding my mouth. A fresh ball of no-knead artisan bread dough is tucked into an old yellow Pyrex mixing bowl on top of the fridge to rise all day, and I’ve just scraped the last spoonful of plain yogurt mixed with dark chocolate cinnamon granola out of the little ceramic bee bowl I bought from Gina at White Swan Studios—a favorite artist I met a few years back at a Country Living Fair. All in all, a glorious start to the day.

We’re going to visit with friends later this morning for brunch, and it’s impossible not to bring gifts (we’ve tried). The common ground between us is rich and beloved—Patrick worked with both of them in medical supplies sales, and shortly after their first daughter was born, we began gathering around food. Our first dinner together was Mexican-themed. Jen is an incredibly skilled cook and baker (ask me sometime about the macaroons she makes); no one went hungry that night. They have two daughters now, and that’s where the gifts come into play. They’re adorable (the girls, not the gifts), and I’m a sucker for their squeals of delight when they reach into the paper bag and pull out something with their names on it. We’ve checked in with their parents on all this, and continue to receive a gracious green light. The older daughter shares my affinity for anything Hello Kitty, the younger one is all social and loves Elsa from Frozen. Patrick and Russell share mechanical interests. There’s always lots to talk about, and today will be no different. We’re bringing everything we need to make panini, some macaroni and cheese for the girls, and a paper bag filled with joy.

When we moved out here, coming up on twenty years ago, we stretched the bonds of friendships that were more city-based and nurtured, not realizing that, over time, the visits and phone calls would wane and move into months, then years without much contact. No deliberate event tinged with anger or offense, just everyone getting on with the lives that were immediately in front of us. I suspect that if we all found ourselves in the same room again, we’d bridge the gap with smiles and curiosity, make good on promises to get together with food between us, and keep the storytelling up for hours. When a friendship can do that, it’s pure gift.

That’s not to say we don’t need to work at these long-distance relationships. I’d not be so casual and cavalier to expect that I bear no responsibility for the essential maintenance that all healthy human bonds require. But the rules of engagement must be elastic, and mutually agreed-upon. Then all parties involved can get on with it and collect the memories that good friends cherish as sacred currency in the economy of love. My purse, so far, has never been empty.

So we drive to Columbus or Delaware or Rochester, NY, or they come out here (wearing boots and jeans most times, because long walks are on the agenda), we eat like food was just invented, and talk about the important things. There is always laughter, sometimes tears, and a decent helping of philosophy with a few guaranteed ‘this would fix the world” strategies tossed in (followed by a sighing of “if only we were in charge”…). It’s a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon, giving us all something to look back on when we’re slogging through an especially slow Wednesday.

Not bad for a bag full of Hello Kitty and Frozen, and a hot panini press on the counter.

Let’s eat.