Those Eternally Linked Lives 26 August 27, 2017
Everything I do counts
in the long tabulation of the
centuries. “Be of good cheer,”
sounds in my ears. Sun reigns.
–Those Eternally Linked Lives 14
I heal. Again. Courage found and
rewarded. I rise to my problems.
One at a time I’ll overcome
both my new and my old fears.
We have cooler days and nights.
I can work outside more often.
Sun is less of a threat. My son
calls to say he may be able to
move here sooner rather than
later. I rejoice. I am confident
we can work out and through
the minor problems, if he finds
his way to returning home. I
Already have good help, but the
thought of his near presence
comforts me in a new way. He
has respect for my independence,
but he wants to help. I stayed
unbiased while he wrestled with
it, but finally said, “If you can
work it out, I’ll be glad.” The
mysterious partner inside me
is grateful. This counts, too, and
helps me finish my work on earth.
Those Eternally Linked Lives 25 August 20, 2017
Finally, a letter from Yuri–three
typed pages, but my Russian is
half-forgotten. I get out my big
dictionary. When I wrote to him
in late June, I’d been reading my
diary pages from when I’d stayed
with him and Vera twenty-two years
ago. He congratulates me on my
Jubilee–eighty years–most of them
writing. How they nurtured me back
then, and they’re still alive. We both
lost Mikhail, whom he calls Misha,
and sends me a note he wrote Misha
a month before he died. They both
longed for their childhood villages–
gone now but never forgotten. Yuri
remembers the yellow flowers under
the cottage’s window. Mikhail remembers
being put upon a horse and seeing a
pink sky, then falling off the horse.
A recurring theme everywhere I went:
the lost village, the rodina, birth village,
lost and never forgotten. A holy grail
to those who remember. He kept taking
me to see the village houses. Once I
stayed in one. He took me into the taiga,
the wild forest, where his village had
been until lost because of the push for
communal farms, and then the war
when twenty-seven million died
in battle or in prison camps. Some
things the memory won’t let go of,
as long as we breathe. We still love
those who loved us, and to whom
we opened our souls. It’s called:
reaching the heart.
Judy with reluctant hen, early spring 2010, during chicken workshop
***
Those Eternally Linked Lives 24 August 13, 2017
We forget: things change all the time.
People change their minds. Our
weather changes. Chickens like their
routines, but they change where they
roost, sometimes hide their nests.
On an old farm, despite neglect,
things grow. A Rose of Sharon leans
through the fence to say hello. Little
blue flowers appear on the Wandering
Jew. Figs ripen and some spoil from
all the rain. After a slew of problems,
a respite: a gift I’d given up on,
forgotten. I got hurt, but I’ve been
healing. I spoke some hard truth,
and was invited to speak again. I’ll
have students in September. My soul
settled in for my older age. I have
to consider my heart, my balance, and
how easily I forget. The weeds feel
impossible, but I know how to summon
helping hands. Wag and I do our daily
walk steadily. I work on manuscripts
I’m determined to publish; plant a few
more beans, find enough figs to sell.
My life resumes its normal rhythms.
Rain replaces the heat wave.
My soul is peaceful once again.
Judy with new books at book party May 21, 2017.
Photo by Johnsie Tipton.
***
Those Eternally Linked Lives 23 August 6, 2017
Banishing fear has
become a habit. Every time I outwit other
people’s worries, I stand taller in my own
view. All it takes is courage, helping those
who let me, and taking in gratefully those
loving hands that give me a reason
to stay alive. –Those Eternally Linked Lives 18
I do keep staying alive. I could have died
on Monday. Instead I fell as I raced
across the road to avoid a speeding car.
She wasn’t looking, she said. She stopped,
pulled me off the road, called nine-one-one.
Other cars stopped, including a sheriff’s
deputy. Then the fire department and
two ambulances. I recognized the voices
of David and Jerry. Claudia came up.
I asked her to put Wag behind the fence.
Later she came back to pray with me.
The phone kept ringing even during the
prayer. I did hit my head. A scalp wound
bled. John Bonitz called. Was I okay?
He heard a car hit me. No, I fell, but
she could have. I’m okay. Sheila called
to say she and Rhonda were coming
over. Then John and Wayne Cross
stopped to check on me. Emails and
phone calls. Rhonda checked my scalp:
“It will heal.” Jeff took me to pick up
my truck. Emma stopped by, having
heard the rumor. Sally wrote from Alabama.
Katie, from Asheville. Then Keely, Donna,
and Terica brought me groceries. Maybe
I couldn’t get to a store? Fruit and other
things I never buy on my simple diet,
but I’m enjoying them. Angelina says,
“You could use this in a novel. I keep
telling people the car didn’t hit you.”
What did hit me was people’s care:
I had to be all right. I am. Healing
well; reminding my children I want
to stay independent, follow my deep
wisdom. Falling’s no fun, but once
again I learned: people love me.
Geese Flying. Drawing by Mikhail Bazankov, 1937-2015
Those Eternally Linked Lives 22 July 30, 2017
The tree we made between
us seeded itself and new flowers
open like white dogwood in North
Carolina, tight knobs while Spring
hesitates; then open-handed once
She makes up Her mind, their
petals reminding us of where, once,
the hands of a good man were
nailed to a tree. Goodness is always
going to suffer in our world, but if
goodness seeded itself, and new
trees grow, and new flowers open,
and new springs give new cause
to laugh and delight in one another,
to speak the heart’s truth knowing
the other listens and cares, it is
enough. . .
You said that one must travel
a long road to reach the heart.
How far have we come now?
I can’t remember very well the
beginning. We opened our souls’ doors
to each other freely then. We laughed
and we were sad. You said, when
I left, “It’s only a light sadness,
Judy.” Soon I leave again. For me
the sadness I feel has never been
light, though I carried it easily.
What choice did I have? No one
knows how much we say to one
another when we don’t speak a word.
From Sun 20, December 1995
Did we reach the heart? I think so.
We both had many claims on our lives,
but from the first hours we wanted to
give everything we had to give. Later we
learned our limits and the long road
appeared. We said nothing would
hinder us–neither the thousands of mile,
our lifestyle differences, nor the language
barrier. Yet all those had their power to
impede the flow of a love we could
neither deny nor let govern our lives.
It’s one way for souls to fuse: when
there’s no other alternative. Our love
became a powerful force in fostering
understanding between two distinct
and very different cultures. Despite
our suffering we did not only reach
each other’s hearts, we stayed there.
The little wooden bird you gave me
still flies. When the light is right, its
shadow dances on the filing cabinet.
I still see you in my mind’s eye, feel
your tight hug as you whisper: “You’re
a hero.” Hear your laughter: “We were
fools!” Then you added: “And miracle
workers.” I can ask no better gift
than to have traveled that long road
to rest safely in your heart.
My figs back in August 1911. Not quite so plentiful now, but they're coming along after hard freeze set-backs a few years ago.
Those Eternally Linked Lives 21 July 23, 2017
I want to root myself here, create an island of sanity and love around me, draw my children, grandchildren, and friends here to see me, and contribute as I can to my community.
From my goals stated in 1996-2012
It will be nineteen years in December
that I have lived in this small house in
Moncure, with a garden, an orchard, and
a small flock of hens. I’d already then
been given many gifts: by a banker, who
outwitted the mortgage rules; by friends
who helped paint and weed-eat and
move a big pile of bricks, which became
my flower garden. Even before I moved
in, I joined the fight to stop a low-level
nuclear dump. We did stop it. Then we
stopped three attempts to site a landfill
and ended ten years of bad air pollution.
I worked to elect more careful county
commissioners, then to keep out fracking,
and since 2014, coal ash. This time
they pushed in before we could stop
them. It took a judge to halt that, but
they’re holding off our justice again.
I hold steady, but more problems have
surfaced: my water heater quit; my
heart began racing; now it’s high
heat warnings keeping me inside
while the weeds flourish. Yet people
turn up to help me: Mike, to challenge
the water heater’s diagnosis; Harold
to mow; Merle, bringing tomatoes
when my bushes stopped producing
shortly after they began. Then two
men from my electric coop, got
the water heater back on track. Many
helpers when I needed them. Everyone
has annoying problems, but I’m older;
so is my water heater and my farm.
Despite unruly weeds and heat,
the figs, grapes, and apples are plentiful.
Some rain would help, and cooler weather.
All this help puzzles me, though I’m very
grateful. Then it hits me. I wanted to
create an island of sanity and love. Looks
like I did, despite the weeds, my aging
body and what belongs to me. The big
world does grow more difficult, but in my
world there definitely is sanity and love.
Full summer, flowers and brownies, 2010.
Those Eternally Linked Lives 20 July 16, 2017
Even if the brakes are being put on
slowly, we know the end of our lives
will come. We can’t be blithe as
once; yet we can live as normally
and joyfully as possible. The doctors
are not worried. Their tests reassure
them that my heart jumping around
and out of its steady rhythm for an
hour can be lived with. For me it is
an unmistakable sign to pay attention:
walk, yes; work, write, dig. See to
the hens, mow and weed-eat; lead
my village in the fight to stop a
coal ash dump, but rest and eat
well, stay alert, respect the signs
as you accumulate years. You
can’t have enough courage or of
the vision that shows you your way,
a step at a time. You’re still here,
aren’t you? Still thriving, loving
those who let you, filling each
day with work completed? Your
conscience is clear; you see all
too well into the hearts of others
whether they imagine yours or not.
