An excerpt from today’s 1,000 words about the farm.
The saving grace of the farmhouse scent.
Still, I would not trade it for anything – not the mud, not the work, not the way it feels like we make such slow progress some days and then so much change on others that I regret I don’t own a high speed camera.
For anything worth doing in life is hard sometimes. It can make your back ache and your arms sore. It can make you wish for days when all you did was ride your bike in the cul-de-sac or read books on the couch after school. Every job. Every relationship. Every dream breaks us down even as it builds us up. The things worth doing – they show us where our mettle lies and if we have any mettle at all.
If all this were easy, if I did not have to do at least one small thing for the farm each day (today’s chore – cleaning up dog poop), if I did not have to rely on Dad and Philip and Heather and a score of good friends to help me pick up trash and gather firewood, if I did not to count every single penny and pray for a windfall to buy a fence, I would not treasure this place. I would take it for granted, so much gift without any cost.
And yet, still, this is all gift. None earned. Not the work. Not the reward. All gift. Just for me because in ways I am only beginning to know, this place is shaping who I am.