It’s cute that I’m the “young blood” here. I adore the ladies, listening to their stories and learning from what they know. When they get to chatting, they teach me so much about cooking, the history of the area, and what they know about old remedies and how to make things. Most of the time, they’re speaking of how their mothers or grandmothers made things, but they were taught as little girls and remember much of it.

But, sadly – and this is sad to me – almost all of the ladies don’t do any of those old things anymore. Even if we give them the excuse of old twisted fingers, that doesn’t excuse them from the lack of telling their stories. I have to question it right out of them.

I’ve noticed a sobering trend among the older women of our generation: they’re just as addicted to devices as they say the kids are. Facebook’s demographic is primarily women over 60. Did you know that? Same with television shows and news programs (men included in those stats). Same with some device games – those clicking ones.

I get it, you’re wishing the kids would call or waiting for the vacation week you’ve planned, and the housework is done, so there’s not much else to do, might as well see what folks are up to on Facebook…

But…listen, I don’t mean to shame anyone, as that will not have the effect I wish. I want to encourage you. We need y’all.

We need you! The kids need you, the babies need you, the mamas need you, the daddies need you, the teenagers, the young adults, and all the ones between the babies and you. We all need you! Here’s why:

 “None of us can be proof against the influences that proceed from the persons he associates with. Wherefore, in books and men, let us look out for the best society, that which yields a bracing and wholesome influence. We all know the person for whose company we are the better, though the talk is only about fishing or embroidery.” – Charlotte Mason

Even if we aren’t with you or listening to you, is there something that would be better than scrolling others’ lives or playing a silly game alone on your phone?

There must be someone who would like it if you called, a grandchild to text, an activity to pursue (I love the old quilting bees and garden clubs – they’re so poorly attended now; we could get them going again!). There is no doubt someone to visit, something to write, or a device to speak into as it records your stories. We need you to look into our town’s history, our family genealogy, the county’s old photographs that were never uploaded onto the Internet.

No matter your passion and no matter your physical limitations, there are many ways for you to be a part of helping us, the ones behind you. We need you.

For years, I’ve been struggling over What To Do (always said in my head like it’s a title). I think I’ve written on that before. Keep writing on Freely Educate as a job, though it’s of no interest to me anymore. Begin our little farm, though we haven’t managed to keep even chickens from the bears? Write (on which site?), though my desk is in a utility trailer and I can’t find paper. (These last two, if you’re curious, are hints of the way life has been difficult lately). Sell salve or ferments, though I don’t have a kitchen or even so much as a countertop to create them on.

My mind was stuck in the mud there, in the What To Do question, and I couldn’t move on from it. The reason I’m here now is because I think I just need to write and to go back to 2008, when I created a blog based on Philippians 4:6

Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things.

This list is a suggestion of what to think about when one’s mind is full of anxious thoughts. In 2008, I had a friend betray me unexpectedly and my mind went into a tailspin of anxious thoughts. I couldn’t stop thinking about the issue. Weeks into it, I ran into the truth that we can only have one thought at a time. I’d also been reading Scripture and bumped into a verse I’d memorized as a child, but read with new insight: “Whatever is true, noble, just, pure, lovely, of good report, virtuous, praiseworthy — think on these things.” Whenever I’d have an anxious or negative thought (every 30 seconds it seemed), I’d switch the thought to something on the Philippians 4:8 list, which I soon began to call “just, pure, lovely.”

It helped me quite a lot to not just try to think up something good but to actively notice something good. So I began noticing the way the sun shone through our toddler’s blond hair, the way the bread’s crust baked perfectly brown, the sound of a bird in the distance, the silhouette of a winter tree. I began sharing those observations on my blog (Just Pure Lovely), and through social media. It was so good for me, and it even helped others, too, based on comments I received.

I never meant to stop, but life changed, as it does. The children could no longer be captured on film (they grew up!), and our move – the one I fussed about in the first two paragraphs here – has left me in such a puddle that I have had difficulty thinking on the just, pure, lovely. I’ve fallen into the muck of thinking about the difficult, insurmountable, and ugly.

That’s why, though this evening I’m surrounded by reminders of a life I want to change, I’m writing here to begin thinking on the just, pure, lovely once again.

Let me explain.

I’m a genealogist on occasion. I dig through old family records, and when I do, I often come upon land deed records. Guess who owns that family land now, 112, 240, or 85 years later? Not me! Nor my kin. Some somebody that we don’t know owns the land now.

My relative, I can see, ‘owned’ the land for only a decade or perhaps a few decades. A blip in time. What he and she did with that land at that time — that’s what has lasted beyond their years. It matters how the land was managed, if trees were left standing, if more trees were planted, if a fruit seed was put into the earth, if the meadow was mowed or dug up, or if a pond was installed. It matters if they killed all predator mammals, or if they destroyed every beaver dam.

What my ancestors did on the land is what impacted the land.

They did not get to keep it forever.

Their lives were short.

my chaos garden at the pond’s edge

My life is also short. I will not ever see the forest trees reach their greatest potential. I am living with the results of the deed owners of the land I am on now. Somebody in the 1800s chopped down all of the largest trees, so I will never see my trees become as massive as they saw. But I am thankful for a past deed owner who took the time and money to install a spring-fed pond. It attracts wildlife and is the ‘crowning jewel’ of our land. His actions have impacted the land – and me – beyond the years of his life.

I hope whoever is on our land in a hundred years will enjoy the trees I plant (I hope they’re massive by then.) I hope their families will pick the fruit from the trees I planted. And I hope they will see the Monarch butterfly migration, the red salamanders, and the big black bears, all because I stewarded the land well while it was “mine.”

I was terrified to ever work on it. For over a year it’s been in my office/studio room. Now and then, my husband who had taken a lot of time and money to find it for me, would ask whether or not I was going to start weaving something soon. It was discouraging to him, I think, but it was also discouraging to me. I knew I was just letting fear stop me.

After a few more goals were met, it was finally the week I dreaded. I have to admit I procrastinated another week just because I was afraid. But I moved forward, I finally made myself begin setting up the loom. I said to myself, what is there to lose? It’s thread; I can cut it off and lose only a dollar or two worth of thread. I finally talked myself into just sitting there and beginning to warp the loom – just begin – but guess what? I ended up going from warping loom – the thing I had dreaded for over a year – to weaving all in the same week! I passed up steps three through ten all in one week once I had done the big thing I was procrastinating on. 

What a life lesson. The next time I have a hurdle or a boulder in my way, or I think there is a giant dragon I have to slay before getting to the other side…if I see a great big gate that I have to figure out how to open, I hope I remember to ask myself: what do I have to lose by trying? And then, do one thing.

And I’m anxious.

Do I call? Do I email a second time? Do I try the support desk and hope the kid behind the screen knows how to help?

Or do I wait?

My mind does not rest, but I choose to set aside my phone and computer for an hour (or I’d keep checking for answers every few minutes). My daughter made me a splendid omelet and scrambled eggs for herself. She picks up Heidi, I pick up my Kindle to where I’m at with Lord of the Rings.

I read this:

 For a while the hobbits continued to talk and think of the past journey and of the perils that lay ahead; but such was the virtue of the land of Rivendell that soon all fear and anxiety was lifted from their minds. The future, good or ill, was not forgotten, but ceased to have any power over the present. Health and hope grew strong in them, and they were content with each good day as it came, taking pleasure in every meal, and in every word and song.

And I thought….home.

That’s what home should be. That’s what I want this home to be.

Soon all fear and anxiety was lifted from their mind.

The future, good or ill, was not forgotten but ceased to have any power over the present.

Health and hope grew strong in them. 

They were content with each good day as it came…

And so here I am, not checking my email, my phone near me but not distracting me, and noticing the pretty Christmas lights, the soft black and white cat sleeping on a pillow near me, the kid so wrapped up in her book that she’s moved to the couch.

I still wonder if I have a reply from the college — but I won’t let the fear and anxiety of what could be taken away from what is now. 

(written around December 2019)