Driving down an old and beautiful country road, Friday, I looked through a thick stand of shade trees and saw an old abandoned family farmhouse peeking out through the trees. It was a sad sight, because I could almost feel and touch the kids playing in the yard, the cows out back in the barn, the rusting tractors were still out in the field.
Ghosts and spirits everywhere. It is easy to say there are too many farmers, if one is not a farmer. It is easy to see they must surrender their way of life and move over to make room for the hordes of city people who use the country mostly for pleasure and weekend retreat from lives that exhaust them and jobs they mostly hate.
These people never have to worry about having enough to eat, and they never to bother worrying about where the food they eat comes from.
Family farms are dying everywhere, and I could feel the business and purpose of this one, another ghost farm hiding out behind bushes and trees off the road. This photograph touched me, it captured something for me.
I have a bleak and gloomy streak in me, and I love broody and cold days like today, I don’t care much for heat and humidity. Outside of Manchester, Vt., I saw the mist settling over the Green Mountains, and it was a mirror of my mood.
At least 19 states have towns and associations that ban clotheslines, ostensibly for aesthetic reasons. They are considered unsightly. Clotheslines are beautiful to me, family works of art. They save money, help the environment, prolong the life of clothes. Even Vermont banned clotheslines until recently, and many of these odd bans have been overturned.
We put our clothesline in a year or so ago, and the clothes feel cleaner and fresher, they don’t stretch or shrink, we save water and laundry detergent and the clothes themselves. Beyond that, they are evocative and beautiful symbols to me. My undershirts were out on today, pennants and flags in support of my life.
Maria and I have been married for six years and we have been through quite a bit together, most of it wonderful, some it difficult, painful and challenging, as is the case with life in general. Our love and connection has only grown and deepened, and our anniversaries reflect where we are in our lives and marriage.
A friend asked me how I felt on our anniversary, and I said I was overwhelmed with gratitude. “Even an old dog hits the hydrant once in awhile,” and she cracked up, she said she hadn’t heard that one before. I was overdue for a good and wise move in life, and I scored big.
This anniversary is very different.
For the past five years, we have gone off to spend a day or two at a quiet and private inn where we talked, talked, loved each other and ate well. The first year or so we were hiding out, all of our friends had vanished after our divorces and we ran off to be together, in a way.
Then, going away, became a habit. In our other lives, we were always going away. Suddenly, we wanted to be home, on our farm, in our house, with one another and the animals, in our town.
This year, we are in a different place. Last year at this time, we thought we might be losing our house, this year we are loving our house, perhaps in celebration of our keeping it. We are, both of us, nurturers at heart, our home needs some loving.
Friday, we went out and bought two beautiful butterfly bushes and some flowers, today we went to the Equinox Nursery outside of Manchester, Vt. and pondered buying some trees. We bought two swamp birch trees and a fig bush. The house is looking great, our Spring Open House is just two weeks away (June 25-26).
Tomorrow, we’re heading out for brunch, then a day of digging, planting and watering. We are enveloping the farmhouse in a cloud of gardens, flowers, lilac and Magnolia bushes and two more birch trees. We already have three. The farmhouse is looking swell. Florence Walrath lived in the farmhouse almost all of her life, to the age of 104, and she was not able to spent much money on the last years of her life.
But by bit, we are bringing the old farmhouse back to life.
My grand vision is to encircle the farmhouse for many years to come with shade, beautiful trees, and some privacy. I will not see these trees grow to maturity, but hopefully I will see them sprout and widen a bit before I go. People down the line will thank me, even if they have no idea who I was, as I thank the people before me who planted those gorgeous maple and apple trees.
Maria’s vision is to encircle the farmhouse with gardens, she is almost there. She held off gardening last year, she was afraid to think about leaving our house, this year she has plunged in with a vengeance.
Three new gardens planted already, halfway through June.
Maria and I are not into rituals like birthdays or anniversaries, people need rituals but I have never liked them much or gotten the point, beyond corporations selling things. It is fitting to celebrate our union by planting and nurturing things, as we have tried to do with one another.
At our wedding, we read Mary Oliver’s poetic plea to put our lips to the world and live, and I think we both have done that. Our lives are our story, encouragement is our faith, to one another, to others who seek and need it.
Our love is a ballet of encouragement and empathy. We were both broken, we are both healing together, every day. We never forget where we were. Being married for six years is not the same as being new lovers, I know that. I can be moody, strange and reclusive. When you are broken, you never fully heal.
Like Humpty Dumpty, you are always putting the pieces back together. Maria sees right through me, I did not know such a person existed on the earth, or could possibly love someone like me. I still sometimes wake up in the night and don’t quite believe it.
Mostly, she grins and bears it. Sometimes she laughs. At the end of the day, we greatly respect one another and what it is we are both trying to do.
It is a lifelong habit to withdraw into myself when I am frightened or confused. Maria always comes in a gets me and pulls me out of the hole. Sometimes she gets annoyed and lets me know.
I was lonely for every day of my 62 years until June 12, 2010. I have not been lonely one day since. If I didn’t wish to be cremated, I’d love to put that on my tombstone.
Year by year, I have become more open and trusting. Maria has become stronger, she has found her voice, is telling her story. Over time, we seem to intersect, we want the same things in the same way for mostly the same reasons. I have not in my lifetime know a better, more honest and loving person. She loves every living thing, human, animal or plant and she treats them all with dignity and respect.
At the nursery, Jesse, our tree consultant, tired up the swamp birches with rope so they would fit into my car. He said we could leave them that way until we planted them tomorrow. Maria could not bear to leave them tied up all night, “I feel bad for them,” she said, “all tied up like that.”
A few years ago, I might have jeered at this, I would have actually, for sure.
Now, I just love her for it, even if I can’t always do it myself. I got out of the car when we got home and helped untie the trees. Maria thought they seemed happy. She knows what is liked to be tied up like that.
In the morning, I’ll give her two presents I hid away. I know she has made me something in her studio, she can’t keep a secret from me any more than I can keep a secret from her. She’ll puff herself up like a blowfish and yell at me for buying her too many presents, and I will promise once more not to buy her any more.
Okay, fine, she will say. She will not be angry for long.
On Route 313, kids for sale. I had three goats once, it didn’t work out. They were smart and fun and Rose nearly went mad trying to herd them – goats can not really be herded by border collies as a rule – but they were also loud and obnoxious and eager to escape and make trouble. Many mornings, I came outside and found them standing on the roof of my car. A farmer told me once never to get any animals that are smarter than you are. Goats were smarter than I was. No goats for us. But they are appealing and fascinating creatures. They would love the weeds and brush and marsh grass out back.
