March 31, 2025
I walk into the cold, not dressed for it–no vest under my coat, my gloves mere calfskin. My hands are stiff and red by the time I turn around. I walk straight down our road and do not turn to walk east into the sun. The clouds are low, living, a cloud deck, what pilots call clouds as they introduce their flights across the country.
Neither Oma nor Dolly care to walk past our neighbors’ dogs because they don’t like being barked at, but the road that turns me into the sun is wet and still gravel and the dogs can pick up ag lime in their coats which means I have to rinse them in the tub. Then towel dry them and wipe up wet footprints.
As I look at the woodland, I think about how Martin Shaw suggests people spend time inside woods, to find their names. He guides people on a rigorous four days of fasting in the wildlands of Britain. He says if you’ve found peace, you might not want to try it. Sitting in the woods without dinner is not my idea of a good time or way to get visions. Besides while part of me might like to catch a glimpse of the “Other World” or to have wild birds lite on my shoulder, longing for such things feels too much like ambition.
I do know about how walking the woods can cleanse a person’s soul and make you sweat. When I was a girl, I hiked through the woods on the farm all the time. One night was particularly powerful so I walked to the trees, unafraid. I watched the moon pop out from behind a tree like it was giving birth to light. I heard steps further in and thought maybe, just maybe I’d see a unicorn.
I almost asked my neighbor if I could sit in there to write about their trees for a Paul Kingsnorth assignment last fall. We’ve seen deer come across this field in the evening. Woods are alive with birds and squirrels and tiny animals. Coyotes as well. Every time I walk here, I wonder at the two big fallen oaks, one with red brown leaves clinging to it.
There’s a storm about to roll across the country. When forecasters warn that it might be bad, a full week ahead of time, you know something nasty is going to happen. We are in the elevated risk area, with our local weather people, calmly urging us to be weather aware, calmly saying it all depends on what the morning storm does on Wednesday. It might suck the energy out of the atmosphere. But if the sun shines afterwards, it might get bad. We heard similar things ten years ago when the EF4 tornado destroyed Fairdale, a small town seven miles from us.
A trough in the jet stream will bring colder air meeting warm gulf air in such a way as to hurl storms high into the atmosphere and make them dangerous. They are also predicting the storms will settle where the Ohio and Mississippi rivers meet, bringing extreme flooding.
Being too cold on my walk combined with a good enough night’s sleep has rare energy busting through me. Last week’s blog touched people, my stats are above average and there are kind people commenting. I feel the joy of being heard. Maybe I should put “major flaw” in every one of my titles so you all will read my work.
My sleep has been troubled. As I’ve mentioned before, I often wake, my heart hurting. At times my legs feel like someone has jammed them with a cattle prod. On Substack I have read that the powers of darkness come in when you breathe rhythmically, when you practice centering prayer, when you use the Enneagram. Rod Dreher writes about how easy it is for the powers of darkness to attack us. I have been rattled knowing family stories of my brother seeing a flying saucer land on our flat and my grandmother participating in a seance so powerful that the table started climbing stairs. No more mystery she vowed.
It is wise to avoid playing with hallucinogenics, psychics, tarot cards. I don’t like the Enneagram because it boils a person down to a number. But I don’t like this fear. I don’t like looking at my friend who says she plays with magic and being afraid. Very good grief. The earth is full of God’s glory. God’s love.
I remembered Christopher Blackeby’s words, something like, “You are full of glory because you are in the throne room with Jesus. The same glory that knocked John on his face in Revelation. Face ablaze. Legs like burnished bronze. Clothes shining white linen. So bright you can’t look. As Christ is, right now, so are you in this world.”
Blackaby said if we take ahold of the truth we are sons of God, no matter what, the spiritual hassle will stop. And it does. We have faith like a shield swallowing fiery darts. Joy billows through me.
Later in the day, we toss the ball for Omalola. Watching her run flat out sings the joy I feel. Mrs. Horse peeks through her fence boards as if to say when are you going to pay attention to me? She pulls on my guilt. The sun is warm and the air seems still.
As soon as we haul the harness to the barn and drag the carriage out of the shed, the wind pops up. We tell ourselves we’ll just take a few turns around the field because we don’t want her working up a sweat. My hands stay relaxed on my thighs. I tell her what a good mare she is. It’s five p.m. with enough sun left to find that warmth and light, despite the chill. Mrs. Horse stays relaxed despite the brisk air and breeze and weather about to change.
During commercial breaks on American Idol, I walk the dogs. The night sky is as exquisite as jeweler’s velvet, pearls and diamonds laid out. The moon rounded by earth shine. The remaining orange of the sun lounged along the horizon. Exquisite. Enough to sit me back in the Presence, in quiet, in joy. It’s a scene to think on when dropping off to sleep.
April 1, 2025
We go to the hospital so I can get blood drawn. We stop to see Mr. P. in critical care. (The place is a labyrinth with the nurse’s station more like a control room for a rocket than a hospital.) He whispers but even close to his mouth I can’t hear what he says. How hard it must be to speak and not be heard. I say a prayer asking the Lord to bring his presence to him. I choke up because I remember the stories. This farmer was so tough, his tractor was hit by a car and flipped over on top of him. He walked away with bruises, nothing broken, though he went to rehab to work out those injuries. Oh Lord wrap your presence around Mr P.
The Daily Office settles in John 6 where Jesus talks about the bread of life. I read about how Jesus fed the 5000 at Passover. The people wanted to make him king, and he slipped through the crowd to hide on the mountain, to pray. I wonder if Moses and Elijah showed up for a chat like they did for the transfiguration. At Passover in a few years, he will make his way to his death.
He walks across the water, so spooky the disciples think he’s a ghost. When he climbs aboard, the wind quiets and they row to the other side where the crowds are waiting. Most will turn away when Jesus gives his cannibal talk: Eat my flesh. Drink my blood. Abide in me. His disciples are grossed out. They see flesh being torn from bones. Blood being gulped, spilling out over their face. They know warriors do this to take on the strength of their enemies.
Even though Jesus fed them with good bread and fish, even though he talks in metaphor, they walk away. He asks the twelve, are you going to leave too? Peter says, “To whom shall we go, you have the words of eternal life…You are the Holy One of God” (John 6: 68 – 69, ESV). Then Jesus throws a snarky curve, “Did I not choose you, the Twelve? And yet one of you is a devil” (John 6: 70, ESV). In another story, Jesus talks about how he will die and Peter says, “No you won’t.” He’s just been told he will be the rock on which Jesus will build his church. “Get behind me Satan.” Seems like there is no place for pride of insight when walking with Jesus.
In Mark, during another boat story, Jesus challenges the disciples as they realize they only have one loaf of bread. He warns them to “beware of the leaven of Pharisees and Herod” (Mark 8: 15, ESV.) I hold onto this line because of how easy it is to think our religious observances make us better than others or bring us closer to God. Jesus even called out the people saying you search the scriptures, but don’t have a clue as to who I am. It’s easy to think we can solve society’s problems through political power. I am enticed to keep looking though these days there’s so much chaos, it’s too much trouble to know what to think.
April 2, 2025
I wake to rain and walk into a gray sky. The clouds aren’t even spooned with grays and blues. They are just blank. We walk to the corner of our road and the road that faces the morning sun and turn around. Rain spackles my coat and pants. The dogs trot along. I am thankful they got right to their business.
Bruce has let Mrs. Horse out but I put her back inside, leaving her loose in the barn. When I shut the door, she whirls. Her ears forward, her body taut. I speak to her. And pull the door shut. There is some thunder. (I don’t want her out when lightning is in the area. I know of one horse struck and killed during a tiny pop up storm.) The cold rain pours. The wind blows.
Bruce spends most of the day watching Ryan Hall Y’all on You Tube. He reports town after town in the path of monster tornadoes. Some look like the EF 4 we saw—a wide dervish, aimed straight at our farm. Friends prayed for us, while Bruce and I hid in the basement. It turned north. Hall’s voice is calm. “Run not walk to shelter. If you live in a trailer house find better shelter. Go to an inside room with as many walls between you and the outside. Wear a helmet. Most people are injured by falling debris.” Then he warns terrible flooding is coming as the serpent flashing reds, yellows and greens settles just east of the Mississippi.
The hard rain eases then stops. The weather service takes down the elevated risk for our area. We turn Mrs. Horse out so she can move around and we can clean up the barn.
A friend of this page, who is touring in Kentucky, hides in a bathtub at her hotel until 4 am, the storm banging around her. A Facebook friend had her house and barn severely damaged, with a 100 trees down. Her horse is missing. When I last looked, there were over 300 tornado warnings.
At church we sing Holden Evening Prayer. “Joyous light of heavenly glory, loving glow of God’s own face, you who sing creation’s story, shine on every land and race. Now as evening falls around us, we shall raise our songs to you. God of daybreak, God of shadows, come and light our hearts anew.”
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