Unexpected joy

Returning to something like normal life

For me, “tears of joy” rarely come, and when they do they trigger self reflection. They sneak up on me and then suddenly there is a reveal. That spontaneous emotion seems to well up from some deep and unexpected paradox that has suddenly presented itself, and so I look inside to chase it down and try to understand why. Why the sudden unbidden and overwhelming sense of happiness, contentment, unexpected satisfaction. What does that tell me about what is going on in my unconscious mind?

Rural life presents its challenges, things that the urban/suburban dweller never really has to think about. Like the well pump going out, for instance. The other day, Jill and I were traveling north on State Highway 29 (otherwise known as the Seminole Trail/Lee Highway). Heading up to Culpepper from Madison to do some shopping in the “big stores” where we can get various things that we do not want to order on-line but cannot find in Madison - including various routine groceries. The local Food Lion is just one slight notch up from Piggly Wiggly or the Dollar store.

Jill and I have taken an intentional break from the constant travel and speaking engagements (but not from our Substack subscribers!), and are just a bit worn out by all of the COVIDcrisis drama. Not to mention the chronic weaponized lies and hate of the cyberstalkers.

She needed to have a routine medical procedure that would require a bit of recovery time. Frankly, I needed a mental health break. Some time to just catch up with the farm chores, deferred equipment maintenance, spend time with the dogs, raise and imprint the emus (to fend off the foxes), get chickens set up and laying again, and just live our lives. Far from the madding crowd.

These are the things that center me, and which bring peace to my soul. I love to work with my back and my hands, and to literally see the tangible fruits of my labors. Enjoy a friends’ birthday party. Breed the mares. Take video of this years’ colts so we can sell them.

Soon the blueberries will need picking, and July 4 is right around the corner.

"I feel thin, sort of stretched, like butter scraped over too much bread"

Bilbo Baggin's famous quote from J.R.R. Tolkien's “The Fellowship of the Ring”

So we are running north up the road to Culpepper, and on a south bound on-ramp I see a combine coming down, with a line of little cars trailing, and that triggers it. That deep and totally unexpected overwhelming sense of happy/sad relief. The tears well up.

Yes, Jill and I grew up along the central coast of California in the ‘70s, but that was a very different time, and we have never enjoyed urban/suburban living. Our ‘70s was a world of dusty roads, Beach Boys on the cassette deck in a ‘67 Chevy half ton, wild beaches and coastline, hiking, rock climbing and riding horses all through the foothills and the coastal valleys. And tending orchards. Avocados and lemons. Living with the land, trees, animals. Being in the wild gets its hooks into you, and city life is just not an option. No way for a person to live, as far as we are concerned.

Out on the road today, I saw a DEADHEAD sticker on a Cadillac
A little voice inside my head said, "Don't look back. You can never look back"
I thought I knew what love was
What did I know?
Those days are gone forever
I should just let them go

Don Henley, “Boys of Summer”

Rural Virginia is our paradise on earth, and we are doing what we can to make this plot of land of ours, this former hay field, more than just a horse farm. It is becoming a botanical park, here at the base of the Hebron Valley, alongside the Shenandoah National Park.

We are embedded in concentric circles of community. Community grounded in farming. Not “Big Ag”, but old school small to medium sized farms. Beef and dairy and crops. In my mind, the combine blocking the onramp symbolized that. People producing food, just going about their daily business. That is the priority. Not the commuters.

When there was a decision in the ‘60s that for some reason the USA had a responsibility to feed the world (or at least that was the propaganda of the time), and that farmers had to “get big or get out”, we lost something important to our collective national soul. Many of our small rural towns dried up and died. Rural life was marketed as boring, and the young people all wanted to go to the city where there were jobs and entertainment. But rural America is the beating heart of what has made this country great. Our traditional ethical framework, families, commitment to hard work, to community, to church, pragmatic innovation, and to self reliance. Just git ‘er done. Those are rural values.

That upwelling of emotion was about the simple daily joy of being surrounded by the land, and by plain speaking people who get up in the morning and get the job done. Day after day. The big grin of the well pump guy missing about a third of his teeth, who dropped everything at a moment’s notice to come out and get the water flowing again. The guy from Kubota who came out and serviced our tractor and mower while gently coaching me on the importance of draining the diesel water trap more frequently. The friend and farmer who produces the high quality hay that we gratefully buy, truck and stack for the horses every couple of weeks. The talkative local carpenter building our new hay shed. Small town Culpepper with its turn of the century charm (it was originally laid out by a recently trained surveyor named George Washington in his first surveying job). The rhythm of planting and harvesting. The open smile of a farm hand.

Most of these people have no idea of the evil that lurks beyond the hills, and have never heard of the New World Order, Great Reset, Klaus Schwab, or Agenda 2030. They are just raising their families, paying their bills, tending to daily life, and harvesting the crops. Jill and I are doing what we can to help shield them from the brewing storms. And there is a sense of wholeness, purpose and deep contentment in that task.

Tears of joy. A deep sense of peace and satisfaction. Of Jill and I being exactly where we need to be, doing exactly what we need to do. Driving north to Culpepper on a summers eve to stock up on groceries.

'You ask me why I dwell in the green mountain;
I smile and make no reply for my heart is free of care.
As the peach-blossom flows down stream
and is gone into the unknown,
I have a world apart that is not among men.'

Li Po