We went out to see the donkeys before heading out to lunch. Lulu (left) and Fanny lined up to see me and let Maria brush them. I lay down on the grass and each came up gently and nosed me, and waited to scratched and kissed on the nose. Okay, I missed them. Okay, I’m glad they’re back. My life feels more whole. The farm feels more real. The camera is happy too, another dimension to look at differently and try and capture. Maria beams every time she sees them. So, she says, do I.
Going to see an artist friend of Maria’s downstate. Hoping to take some photos, to finish a wonderful book called “Tinkers” by Paul Harding. Hoping to go to Merck Forest Sunday to herd sheep and lambs with Rose. 2 p.m. Finishing up text for new Stone wall notecards on Redux. Maria is making Kindle and Ipad bags, can you believe it?
I got a poignant e-mail from someone who runs a small business and will soon have to lay people off from a business that has grown for 10 years but is now struggling in the recession. “I can’t stand the thought of letting people go that I know are not easily employable elsewhere. Now I work all the time to try and turn things around and can no longer sleep for more than a few hours…and now the anxiety is out of control.”
When my own personal troubles escalated – it was at the start of the recession, and the air was filled with gloom and fear – someone told me “everybody survives,” and I know what he meant. Fear is the unwanted stepchild of life and it seems to me it gets so much worse when we lose sight of the fact that we can not control life or its many challenges, we can only react well to them. This is a person I would love to work for – her energy and thoughfulness come right through the compute. She has done the best she can, and I have learned that the worst anxiety comes from thinking we can control the way the world moves, and thus feel responsible for it. It’s a lot to take on. If there is a God, that is surely his work, not mine.
The battle against fear does not ever end. It ebbs and flows, rises and falls, takes different and insidious shapes and forms. This is where I love to think of Winston Churchill. I am not big on wars or military analogies, but there are points in life when you have to put your feet on the ground, take a deep breath, look into yourself and say, I will simply not be brought down by this, not succumb to it. I will survive. Lots of small steps. Every day. Failure and defeat are simply not options.
We are going back to Merck Sunday about 2 p.m. to work with the lambs and sheep there. Couldn’t get there today, or Friday. Might make it Saturday afternoon. I am a member of the Merck Forest and Farmland Center, a beautiful 3,000 acre farm and camping retreat in Rupert, Vt.
I am not a person who often goes backwards, or who looks back. But I seem to be going back these days. I am not leaving the farm. The donkeys returned last week and the sheep in a week or so. This is not what I thought would happen. I thought we would have moved by now, and that my life with animals other than dogs was over. Doesn’t seem to be. My friend Margaret jokes that the way to make God laugh is to say “I have a plan.”
He is perhaps doubled over laughing at me.
It feels like a farm again to me. In the morning, Lulu and Fanny wait, watching. They seem to know if I have a carrot or a cookie. Or not. Donkeys are patient, they seem reflective. I remember about donkeys that if you have a needle in your pocket – if you have to give them a shot – they seem to know it and take off. To treat them, you have to get them into the barn and lock the doors, which you can do with grain or cookies. Donkeys remember. I love their soft bray in the morning when I put my foot down on the floor and get out of the bed. They hear it.
