The Edge

By February, I'm just about hollowed out: wool and bones.  I can be by turns randomly aggressive and spontaneously weepy (Marcy finds this somewhat amusing by this point in our life together). I've worked outside for the majority of my adult life, and I wouldn't dream that away for a moment.  A known facet of this choice, however, is the Claustrophobia of Cold that encroaches every year around this time. The Devil I know.  I'm necessarily in it every day, all the time, with no escape hatch.  (We all live in a winter submarine...c'mon, sing with me!)  Last year I had steady work on a larger job and I whisked us all away to a hotel with a pool, hot tub, and television for the weekend; that kind of escape is just not in the cards to be dealt this winter, and it basically bums me out (for lack of a more apt descriptor...).  And so I keep working, keep moving sheep and feeding chickens at dawn and dusk, keep building things and moving materials, keep putting on that forty pounds of clothing.  Again, this is by no means a complaint so much as a premise.  And, okay, maybe whining a little, but I digress.  Just a premise. 

We live, as it was put recently, 'on the edge'.  To say we're paycheck-to-paycheck is somehow remarkably romantic an expression: it's scary as hell sometimes.  It's a choice of lifestyle more than anything (one cannot serve two gods, after all), and maybe someday all the cylinders will fire in cosmic synchronicity (whoa..!) and the money will be more abundant.  For now, I serve my God in my works, by which I mean I need desperately to create, to be creative, with my mind and my hands, and to put me inside behind a desk (I've tried.  God knows I've tried a few times.) is to cage an animal and watch it pace at the door.  I also thrive on care: the rhythm the sheep provide for me is invaluable; the chickens bring me so much joy; and without my family I'm pretty sure I'd dessicate and scatter in the wind (did I mention my tendency for hyperbole?).  I could, and in the past have, sacrifice the creation and care aspects for money, but what that means for me is to not serve something higher, something more true and authentic about myself.  (I don't mention the impact on the family, and it has proven severe, because I feel it's likely superfluous in this milieu.)  So I serve my God in care and creation as I'm able and trust is true. 

We have burned four and a half cord of wood this year.  A lot for our little home.  I only bucked up three cord in the off-season in preparation, as we've not used much more in the past couple of years.  And so with humility, a heavy heart and hat in hand, I asked our dearest friends (and by great Grace, neighbors) for some firewood to get us through.  We dug through a pile in the yard and loaded my truck last weekend, for which I was very grateful.  When I returned home, I backed the truck up to the bare woodshed and dropped the tailgate, and this event transpired.  
 I stood staring at this load of icy, snowy wood I was now going to need to unload and felt this incredible, forceful wave of gratitude.  The wood, of course: it provides us with heat.  The kindness and generosity of our friends?  Without question.  But coupled with these was this sense that I was being presented, on a grand scale, a blessing, a lesson, a....I still don't really know how to describe it other than to say at that moment I felt close to my God.  This pulse that reverberated through me was the koan,
"Magical power,
marvelous action!
Chopping wood,
carrying water..."
As I ruminated on this (which I liken to a deep, far-off-feeling meditation) while stacking wood, the blessing, the nearness I felt washed over me.  There are workshops, corporate retreats, entire businesses created to provide us with lessons on this, but it's simulacrum: it cannot be authentically grasped without living it.  The blessing is the edge!  If we don't have this wood, we have no heat.  If I don't carry the water to the animals, they don't survive.  And much of this is metaphorical, but some of it not.  The gravity of chopping wood and carrying water is equal to the importance of living and dying on a terrifically (sometimes terrifyingly) tangible level.  Perspectives are vastly different from here.  Here's how my thoughts run (just to clarify, because this seems important to me, not because of my typical ebullience.  Probably...) :
If I have not known the edge, maybe I never really gave too much thought to my actions.  That blanched, plump, plastic-wrapped chicken I picked up from the supermarket is pretty far removed from hatching, raising, and processing these roosters we've been eating.  If I can afford the relative ease of oil, why on Earth would I want the headache of a woodstove?  If I can avoid lifting and moving and walking miles over hill and dale, in all kinds of weather, wouldn't I?
Years ago these things were coming up for me.  I remember thinking about the health benefits of being in motion, of being outdoors, of sourcing my own food. More recently I recall talking to the children about animals, vegetables, growing and harvesting, questions of dominion and the paths-to-spiritual-paths this carries with it.  Questions, and ones that ring of higher Truths to me, if only in the seeking.
 
For me, the trade-off thus far has been financial, and, by degrees, comfort.  But I've been spartan, often monastic in my efforts to find a better understanding of my God for some time.  And I guess maybe that's the gambit for me: I define myself as a father and husband actively and perpetually seeking a dearer relationship to my God.  There exists no conflict for me in serving my family, our animals, and my God: they are each an expression of the other.  Needs are met and love is in abundance in these relationships, and thanks to the edge, I can see that very, very clearly.

It's not for everybody, nor should it be, but I needed desperately for you to know so you can see where I live, in my mind and my soul, and that I'm not just bat-sh*t crazy. 
Not that I've taken that option off the table.

I'm really glad you've allowed me to share this with you.  Thank you.