Country Chronicles: Choosing Wonder and Seeing Beyond

Posted on October 22, 2011 by melissafed

Where I roam, people are very likely to find you ironic, lame, to mock. The worlds of university or adolescence? They are steeped deep in sarcasm. This is a language I am fluent in.

These wonder-bound kids I am raising? They are not. Their language is full of mystery, magic, wonder, awe…they teach me new things.

There has been a lot of exploring done by my family lately. We perched in the widows of hotel towers. We sat on the edge of ferries, and watched the world whizz by jeep widows. We threw rocks in the ocean and found sea glass and other treasures.

The kids have wandered through forests on what we like to call ‘going for an explore’. They ask me questions about leaves changing and fog rolling and how the rain clouds form. They stop every five steps to let sand drizzle through their fingers. I consider rushing them but then remember, this is the greatest gift being a mother has given me: A sense of wonder.

These kids have made everything new again. Every beauty spark, lights a fire in me as I fan it for them to see. I walk slow now, I notice the colours of things, I search for beauty to reveal, for splendor to explain, creation to receive. Today, again, I will just sit back and watch what lights their eyes, and I will slow to enjoy it with them.

Today, I will choose to consider the reckless extravagance of a peacock feather, the design of the hawk as he treads air, consider what helps that bird to fly trusting that knowledge will help me set these babes aloft, and perhaps in that I can also catch a lift. I will have no choice but to be thrown from the seat of mockers to get a glimpse of the great beyond.

Country Chronicles: Becoming Switchback Ranch

Posted on September 24, 2011 by melissafed

The ministry season is heating up over here. Our dreams for this land are growing feet and we are so excited about it. This place is not our own, we just get to live here. This place belongs to Royal Bank. I kid….well sort of…it actually does of course BUT more than that it belongs to God.

Seriously though…we moved here to create a space for people to re-engage with nature, to help them meet again the One who made it. We are calling it Switchback Ranch. A place for turning. A place for climbing. The metaphor ends there. Mostly it is named this because we live atop a mountain and you must climb a steep switchback to get here…

We kicked off the season a few weeks ago with a staff prayer night. We invited everyone up for a potluck and prayer walk.

We had our first care group here this week too. We’ve not quite finished all the things we are hoping to get organized, but I think they had fun. The mini bike track is made, though it does need to be packed down a little. Joel installed street lights (thanks Clayton & Cheryl!). We also brought the Ark golf cart home and the young people seem to love safaris as much as our kids. Though…the boys jumping out of the woods making the girls scream may have added to the excitement of the event.

And under construction? A parking lot. Joel has cleared it and now we are waiting on the excavation company to come this week who will flatten it out and also try to deal with our switchback driveway by stretching out the corners etc. Hoping for the best! Also “Abins Cabin” is a chapel/treehouse that Adam is building in the back corner of the property. Joel is lining one of the old sheds with cedar and turning it into a wood fired sauna.

And me? I’m just all kinds of thankful. Loving this stage of life. Loving my work. My family stage and our ministry here. Excited to see what God can do with it…and us…as we surrender it to Him

Country Chronicles: Where I’ve Been

Posted on July 22, 2011 by melissafed

How is it that I’ve only written two blog posts in three weeks?

This picture sums up the only defense I have. Do you see that glint in her eye? That mischief brewing just under the surface? That firecracker just about to ignite?

Yup. That must be it. This girl is just so very two right now and it would appear, one only has so many words to spend each day and mine are all spent by the time she goes to bed.

“Get off of there please”

“Oh Emily. PLEASE GO TO SLEEP”

“Don’t bite your brother”

Ya da, ya da, yada….

The anthem of every mother everywhere. By the time they are asleep I have energy only to crawl to the couch and enjoy someone elses words.

These rainy summer days have been full though. Very, very full. Filled with cardboard cities for trains…

Storm watches.

Reunions with the dearest of friends.

Filled with camping trips and quick visits to daddy at camp.Weddings and showers. A slightly bigger work contract (yahoo and YIKES). Visits with friends. Playing outside. Picking wildflowers. Hikes with cousins. picnics. Road-trips. Play dough. Trampolines. Bikes. Dirt. Finn McMissle. Swimming when the sun shines.

And did I mention the rain? La Nina I am not a fan.

But then again…one does need rain to make a rainbow…

And I’m left speechless yet again.

Country Chronicles: Wildflowers

Posted on July 11, 2011 by melissafed

I know what your thinking. Nature photos…Melissa is about to lay a heavy on us. If you’ve followed this blog for any length of time, you know that I default to random flower shots when I am processing the deeper questions.

Not this time though.

This time I am just absolutely astounded with what is blooming on our property this time of year. Every ditch filled with lupins, every field and hillside covered in daisies, tiger lilies and wild roses at every turn. Amazing.

Just so beautiful. We love it here more every day.

Next time you see these photos, and they are treated with sepia or black and white? Mentally prepare…I’m about to lay it on thick ;-).

And just a little P.S…the kids dressed themselves. Emily came out and Joel said “Wow Emily nice booty shorts”, Emily said “I love my booty shorts”. I puked a little in my mouth…Lord help me raise a daughter well.

Nature Enthusiasts: AKA We may become hippies

Posted on June 12, 2011 by melissafed

“Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.”
— Helen Adams Keller

We’ve moved to the woods and my brain is still adjusting to the fact that I will see creatures on a regular basis. It’s the assumed risk you take living out here. To us though, detaching from the earth is riskier than embracing it.

That said…

The neighbor dog “Sam” had a sleep over last night. By chance Joel and I happened to be sitting on the deck as he emerged from the woods where he usually jumped out and scared me out of my skin as I pushed children on swings. He couldn’t make it through our new fence. He tried hard. He dug a little. He thought about jumping. He is not a small dog. He couldn’t do it. Joel and I went and put the kids to bed and met back on the deck for a late dinner about an hour later and Sam the dog was on his twentieth trip around the perimeter of our fence trying to find a way to me (don’t worry I went and visited him). It made me feel good to know even with all his trying and knowledge of our house that he could not get in. And this morning, when I watched him chase a bear down my driveway, it made me feel even better (MAN…a BEAR CAN MOOOOOVVVEEE). We also had a coyote sighting this week. The fence is my friend.

Other indicators that we are becoming thoroughly ‘countrified’ include the following list. You might be spending too much time in the woods if (in the style of Foxworthy):

You dress up your kids to go to town in their dress shoes (but those are gum boots)

Your husband takes you to a fancy golf club for brunch BUT there is fencing on the roof of your sport utility (because you don’t want to have to drive to town TWICE in one day).

Post brunch, three-quarters of your family goes rolling down the hills of said golf course until they almost get hit by a golf ball.

Your husbands chainsaw is worth more than your vehicle.

You have a peaceful bubble bath post bedtime on mother’s day and hear four different kids of motors running outside your window. One of which is a snow mobile. No we don’t have any snow.

You are in Mexico and say to your cousin “You sure you aren’t going on a date? We can go on our own? You are seriously East Coast Contemporary and we are completely West Coast White Trash”

Anyways, We’re really noticed while hosting youth groups up here how urbanized and out of touch with nature the kids in our community are. Its sad and a bit scary. Why would you protect a wilderness that frightens you? Why would you fight for an environment that you don’t understand?

And so Personal Mission number 8 billion 72:

Make sure my children understand and love nature they way my parents taught me to.

Maybe I’m the only super nerd/hippie in the making, but then again, maybe I’m not. I made a nature journal for our family to keep track of the things we identify this year. I have a page for birds we identify, animals we see, plants we learn the names for, bugs we capture and look at. I thought other people might want to use it? I don’t know. If you do you can download it here.

Happy trails friends.

Books we like:

Keeping a Nature Journal

National Audobon Society Guides (many at the used book stores!)

A great resource from “A Holy Experience” Nature Resources (monthly teaching units)

Tipping Point

Posted on May 5, 2011 by melissafed

I’ve got to tell you, it’s not the last time that will happen. I saw that little girl laughing wild one moment while you chased then turning on you eyes full of fire. The moment when that happens is not something I can teach you. The tipping point from joy to rage is, in some women, the width of a head of a pin.

I will never be able to explain at what point you will know that recovery is impossible, gravity has triumphed and the only option you have is to fall with grace.

I don’t think I will be able to explain to you the subtle change in a strawberry that turns it from the sweetest delight to rot. You will learn by sampling many and you will learn how the texture changes, how the smell shifts. Today, after few sips of smoothie you left the table and came back refusing to have more. You’ve tasted sour milk and anything left behind is ‘old’. You know already how distasteful warm milk is on the tongue.

I drove past an elementary school today and my stomach jumped into my throat. It can be ugly there. You will have to learn for yourself how fast the economy of cool can shift. Learn what darting eyes mean and feel the sting of a conversation intruded; the function of which is to tear you to shreds.

Choose wisely then, son of mine, which fulcrum you place the lever of your life. And remember, wherever you tip, I’ll be pressing on the other side, doing my best to lift you out of the dirt.

Country Chronicles: He’s back!

Posted on April 30, 2011 by melissafed

Here is a good story.

Joel called on his way to town to pick up the youth kids to come over He said that he just spotted the owl again on the fence post. Emily and I both squealed and then my girl raised her index finger in the air, stopped short her squealing and said:
“But…we can’t scare it away” very seriously.

“Lets go, let’s go!” I said and we headed down the driveway. People should know that heading down my driveway is no small task (its long and its steep!), especially when it snowed three inches in the morning and that snow has turned the driveway to mud. In any event Em and I will not be deterred and we run down the hill while Emily YELLS

“Lets go see da owl. Lets go see him. I’m going to take a present from him”

In our exuberance…we may or may not have got going to fast.

I may have seen Emily blur past me in no-good-for-running gum boots.

I may have shouted at her to slow down.

I may have tried to catch her.

I did not and the poor little girl ended up FACE first in a mud puddle. I wish, oh I wish, I had a photo for you (I admit I was tempted to take the photo before rescuing her but thankfully I thought better of it) because I’m not sure you will believe me if I tell you that her face and left shoulder were literally stuck in the mud. Her feet where in the air. It was amazing.

She only cried for a moment thankfully, though she did pout occasionally for the remainder of the outing because of her very dirty self and she did insist that I carry her oh-so-muddy self all the way to the top of our mountain when we were finished. However we would both tell you..

So. WORTH. It.

What an amazing creature. And yes…most definately a Great Gray Owl.

Country Chronicles: Barn Raising & Learning to Do Community

Posted on April 27, 2011 by melissafed

There have been points in my life in recent years that I put up strong and impermeable fences around the borderlands of my family. I thought the way to keep us strong together was to keep others out. I believed that if we spent energy on others, we would run out of love for each other. We have found the opposite to be true as we are experimenting with expanding the boundaries, inviting others in. I want to do community better.

I’ve sat next to people thinking we were going deep only to find out just days later that their world was shattering, heart all broken up. I’ve thought I was loving people well only to find out later that I wasn’t. I’ve not been at hospital bedside, holding hands, when I should have been. I’m terrible at phone calls but I want to do community better.

My mamma said to my daddy last weekend “whatever happened to an old-fashioned barn raising? When everyone comes and they get a barn up in a weekend? That just doesn’t happen anymore…”I thought that is true but then this weekend, my husband built a fence, and young men kept finding their way up our mountain and digging ditches. He didn’t call any of them and they built a fence to keep my children safe. I gave them ham sandwiches and we heard about a couple of love stories in the making and they called it ‘the property’ (instead of Joel and Melissas house) and it was good. We also got a new truck except it is old. A dear one gave us a Jeep a few years ago. We gave our Pathfinder to a guy who needed it. He gave it to another friend when he could afford better. He passed it to another who kept it for a while until the gas was too much. It came home today. We trade around vehicles again because one truck is better than another and one needs a different kind and I think this is how church is supposed to work.

There is so much for me to learn on this. Much of the time community, authentic and true, scares me. People in the flesh make me nervous. But then, there is this new fence. It is permeable and it creates safe places for gathering and life building.

And friends? This is something we just have to get right; people are lonely and broken and have needs right next door to you. We have to do community better.

Country Chronicles: Incongruencies

Posted on April 17, 2011 by melissafed

There is something weird about me. Birds, when they get too close make me nervous. Birds, at a distance, are also some of the most beautiful things in the world. When a bird suddenly flies up while I am walking I jump and get really nervous. When I see a bird of prey through my car window I am liable to pull over and watch for extended periods. I don’t get it either.

I blame the giant rooster from my childhood who survived the coyote attack that killed the rest of the chickens. He got some sort of post trauma injury and would attack us if we went in; even if you didn’t go in he would stare at you with eyes that I’m pretty sure glowed red and that would bore through to your soul if you stood outside the coop too long. Terrifying.

In any event, because of this jumpiness people might be surprised to learn that I’m becoming quite an ornithologist. The favorite things I’ve seen this week is the mating pair of mallard ducks that have moved into our little pond. I’ve made up whole stories about why they’ve moved to the country to get away from it all. The two of them sat quietly down there all week, every time I would drive in they would be sitting side by side watching the world go by. I’ve also been a little jealous that Joel and the kids spotted an owl of some sort the other day. We’ve narrowed it down to a Great Gray or an adolescent Snowy Owl. Yellow eyes and lack of tufts narrow it down to those. Our little bird feeder has become a favorite spot for all sorts of song birds and I chased away a woodpecker from my deck this week too.

This week we’ve also watched the land erupt with all kinds of kids, all over this place. Thursday night we seriously enjoyed hosting several care groups and once again realized how hard it is to be a teenager. Especially a teenager with disability. I watched a group of four girls talk about their experiences with a boy at school and the hostility he treats them with, the mock attention he gives, their perception is so skewed. It makes me want to stand up and shout at someone. Instead we invite them here. We try to live out family life well in front of them. Loving our children first even in the midst of all the chaos that is happening around us…could this be the first time they’ve seen a functional family? Could we light a small fire that they could warm themselves beside? Could that carry them through the week ahead? We hope so and as we watch care group leaders full of grace and patience I’m almost sure of it. Last night Joel spoke at church and about half way through the evening my throat stopped up as I saw afresh the passion with which he speaks of his call to the oppressed youth of our community.

I’m a little scared of marginalized teenagers to be honest. Its different from birds though…teenagers are much more beautiful face to face, one on one, if you dare get close enough.

Country Chronicles: Perfectly Kept House is the Sign of A Misspent Life

Posted on April 9, 2011 by melissafed

The later of the title is a message to myself not to you. I have a sneaking suspicion that I will not have opportunity to be inside my house again until next fall. So, should you happen to stop by our place, chances are good we will entertain you outside and possibly make you pee in the woods. Not really.

This morning by 7:55 my son was in the newly constructed sandbox. This is exactly twelve hours from when he last played outside.

It is still cold here, but he is unstoppable and honestly I feel the same. We are EAGER to say the least to make outside home too. J and I lugged all the kids stuff up to what will soon be the kids area (it still needs to be organized).

In the background there is the old animal shed that we are converting to a play house for them. Owen and I also filled the bird feeder that Pappa Todd brought for us and little boy had to be held back from running back in the house to wake daddy (who was up all night with a sick baby girl) to hang the new bird houses and feeder.

We also hit the jack pot in regards to resourcing our adventures in being nature enthusiasts at the used bookstore yesterday. National Audubon Society guides to North American trees, bugs and wildflowers. My brother bought me the Field Guide to the Night Sky a few years ago so now I feel like we have a perfect little selection for up here! I couldn’t resist the bird book either as it was the same one I remember being around mom and dads when I was a girl. Happily I also got a great deal on the next book club selection!

We also started our nature guide. We are keeping track of all the plants we identify in it. So far, we’ve only identified a mullein and pussy willows.

O took his ‘big mullein’ to preschool for show and tell and thoroughly impressed his teacher. We picked the pussy willows for our Easter Tree.

Anyways…we better get back outside. We just came in to get E dressed and ready to rock the day. We don’t want to waste any sunshine because… gulp… gasp… the forecast looks a bit gross again for next week.

Happy trails friends!