jumping back in

with a walk in the field, lost in time

Hey - It’s been a long time. but I’m just gonna go ahead and jump back in from this spot right where I’m at.

This morning I made a cup of coffee and then walked with it and the dog out into our field where I stood a moment with the tired sunflowers. So many of these once bright faces of summer are now drooped and fading away, yet in spite of the weary nature of this patch, there is still a spirit of standing, turned to the sun, steady to meet whatever the day might unfold.

While our 7-month-old puppy galloped exuberance through the tall grass and dashed snoopy-nosed across the field, I walked over to the pumpkin patch. It has been fun for me to watch these fabulous, huge bright orange splotches grow into such intensity of color against our summer-weary-brown hillside.

Nearly every morning I go out and walk the field and it is here by the pumpkins that I often feel the loss of my chickens most acutely. The girls used to walk this hill with me, Scratch and peck, scratch and peck, bottoms-up, chicken waddling delight.  (In fact, it was because of them that I began this morning routine. It is because of a 78# puppy that I keep on.) Last fall when the color orange dotted the hillside, the girls helped me with the pumpkin harvest. It is nearly time to harvest again. But they are not here to help me this time. Instead, I carry a ragged hole in my heart, torn by their violent, unexpected deaths in the spring. I miss them dearly.

This morning I walked on from the pumpkins, following my usual trail across the field to the edge of the main garden where I stopped to take a picture of the corn. This plant has offered up such gorgeous presentations of color, texture, and pattern through this growing season and I have enjoyed watching. Today, as I lined up my shot to get the barn in the background, I noticed that my own shadow didn’t fall into the frame like it would have on days earlier in the summer. The sun has moved. My shadow falls differently. The seasons are changing.

During the decade I spent in Alaska I learned a lot about light. Way up there, high above the equator, amidst that great big dramatic landscape, I learned to see how light shines in particularity upon a place. And over time, I learned to orient myself within the patterns.

This morning as I stood out in the field by the garden I thought a bit about how this place where I am currently living feels so unfamiliar to me. Never mind that I have spent quite a few of my earlier years literally living not far down the road in several directions.

We have come to live here once again, but this time we find ourselves caught up in an intense season of transitions. It is bewildering. I tap my skills. I watch the light. I look for the patterns. But I am disoriented.

As I stood thinking this morning, I started counting beats.....

Light falls across my face
angles of time on place
My watch is broken

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Related—
https://jennifersearls.com/what-even-is-saving-time/
https://jennifersearls.com/taking-notes-advent-day-2-hope/

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My handholds this week —

• Friends keeping track of me.

• My sister pointed me to this song on the most recent Porter’s Gate album, which I completely missed when it released earlier this year.
  
  I feel these opening lyrics. Exactly —
  The Spirit is moving over the waters of our tears
  Our bodies are yearning for the joy of coming years
  But the Spirit turns our empty groaning into prayer
  Even now we wait in hope for what the Spirit bears

  
  Spirit move!
  Keep on moving…..
  

• Art classes! I’ve enrolled in some Lendon Noe classes and am having a very good time exploring new techniques and ideas under her gentle, creative tutelage. Stay tuned! ;-)

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I’m not ready to add him to the handhold list yet, but this puppy wants to be on it and I am beginning to think he has a chance.