plans for the future

Are a bunch of crap... but I am actually going to count on as if it's reality that Justin and I will be getting married on May 30th. All these other things i will tell you about are wishful thinking, taking some faith and trust in the Divine and not worrying if they do or do not happen.

our plans:
a marriage on May 30th 2009 with flowers and music and dancing and sunshine

after this, in chronological order I hope to:
1.not get pregnant
2.lose 5-10 lbs
3.begin doula certification. seriously, I am really doing this one.
4.move to the farm with my husband as an intern Jan 2010
5.figure out a 2 year AG project/apprenticeship in a developing country within a Muslim community/people group
6.move back to texas
7.buy a milk cow
8.begin midwifery school in 2013ish
9.have lots of babies

for all this I am excited.


Yesterday Justin turned 25. We were on the Easter retreat with Hope Fellowship so the only special thing he got was brownies. So tonight I made Justin a birthday dinner. I put in a lot of planning as it was my first attempt at a couple of these things, but all of it was a great success:

Bacon wrapped fillet mignon (cooked medium well. I was shooting for medium, but Ihadn't ever grilled steaks before at all, so we were happy.)
Fresh green beans
Potatoes
Chocolate creme brule
Kendall-Jackson Meritage wine

He was pleased, and I was proud. Papaw would have been too.

Things are pretty much the same here:

always changing. But oh, there is nothing new under the sun!

Ellie and I dug, tilled, mixed, smoothed, and planted a garden at the new house. Thus far, baby tomato, pepper and cauliflower transplants thrive with many brothers and sisters soon to join them.

I retreat to the swing on the farm today reading from Wendell Berry's Sabbath Poems. The beloved cottonwood above me now blocks out most of my view of the sky with her recent spring plumage-- green buds ripen to bring a shower of feathery cotton in attempt to continue her kind after her death.

The ewes crowd to the mangers;
Their bellies widen, sag;
their udders tighten. Now
The little voices cry
In morning cold. And now
the garden must be worked,
Laid off in rows, the seed
Of life to come brought down
Into the dark to rest,
Abide a while alone,
And rise. Soon, soon again
the cropland must be plowed,
For the year's promise now
Answers the year's desire,
Its hunger and its hope.
This goes against the time
When food is bought, not grown.

When I am still and quiet enough, the patterns of life emerge. Continuous cyclical change characterizes the course of all created things. What is new will be old, what is born will die and take its Sabbath rest in the earth. Where there is death and decay, even destruction at the hand of us beasts, new life will come. All things die in ways large and small, actual and metaphoric. All things pass. This is sure and trustworthy. Am I to fear this inevitable passing? Surely the answer is no! This is great reason to rejoice and hope! All things come to pass, and all things pass to come.

Don't you see? Here we glimpse the future. That of which we have read, of which we hope, long, and for which we know we were made-- the anticipated, impending, glorious future, the Kingdom which is just beyond the horizon, is also at hand. At hand in these metaphors of God’s creation. All for which we wait is coming, is certain... is here.

Bring it to life- live it into existence.

The bud swells,
Opens, makes seed, falls, is well,
Being becoming what it is:
Miracle and parable
Exceeding thought, because it is

Immeasurable; the understander
Encloses the understanding, thus
Darkens the light. We can stand under
No ray that is not diminished by us.

The mind that comes to rest is tended
In ways that it cannot intend:
Is borne, preserved, and comprehended
By what it cannot comprehend.

Your Sabbath, Lord, thus keeps us by
Your will, not ours. And it is fit
Our only choice should be to die
Into that rest, or out of it.

Shabbat Shalom