Ice Jam

It’s been more than a month since I’ve posted and I’m sorry about that. I'm going to try to ease back in here. I’ve been dammed up like the Zumbro river I mentioned in the last issue of Notes From Toad Hall. We captured a little video of the muddy waters and chunks of ice moving under the bridge. The gradual building of pressure finally broke an ice jam and we happened to be there at the moment it happened. Something I’d never seen before. It was both frightening and fascinating at the same time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Y-kW3_ztzI&feature=youtu.be

Ice jam on the Zumbro River

Everything has had to come together from prepping, selling, looking for and purchasing another house and it has, in amazing ways. But I am excruciatingly aware that people do this all the time, and some do it over and over again, and I am that anemic American that thinks moving is tough. During the first six years of our marriage we moved thirteen times; somehow I’ve either forgotten what it took or just don’t have the stamina anymore. Plus, it has been thirty-three years since we last moved; that's a lot of time to forget how to pack boxes. You’d think I’d be more mature about the unknowns and the stress, but no, it seems not.
It’s not just the upheaval of moving or entering a new stage of life, it’s a combination of other things that add to being somewhat depressed and emotionally jerked around. Like earlier this week I learned that my recent up-tic in hearing loss qualifies me for hearing aids and that this isn’t going to go away, like I hoped it would. And I may need to wait awhile before we can afford them. (So I might be saying WHAaaa? a lot.)  One moment I’m so thankful we sold Toad Hall in three days and the next I’m quite certain we will never find another house that works for us and we’ll end up living in a yurt in my mother’s back yard. This has made it hard to think or write in a fundamentally coherent way. On lots of days going to bed with Almond Joy bars and People magazine seems like a good option, but honestly, I only succumbed yesterday when I couldn’t resist George Clooney on the cover. But even more shameful, is being tempted to buy the nasty National Enquirer. Fortunately I said, Satan, get behind me, and really? I mean, really? People, I don’t think dressing in a kilt qualifies as cross-dressing.

Camilla's World Falls Apart

 I have a friend whose family has been with the State Department and they have relocated across the world many times. She says that each time they moved she wished she were a nun and only needed to pack an extra habit, prayer beads and a cot, but the feeling passed once they got to their new home. I count on that feeling to return. The good news is that we haven’t needed to down-size as much as we initially thought, and in the new house we get to look out the back to a wooded ravine and park full of birds, predators, wild ginger and ramps. A bedroom and laundry on the main floor, and a wonderful and convoluted journey through the wilderness of real estate negotiations brought us to this house. I didn’t think we would make it, but my husband did. In all, we have much to thank God for.
Thank you for stopping by and, again, I apologize for being so spotty with postings, but don’t know how much better I will do in the next few weeks as we continue to pack and plan to move at the end of the month.

"In the bleak midwinter" the car breaks down

"In the bleak midwinter long, long ago" …  Christina Rosetti's poem sang through my head for hours as we drove through the North Dakota prairies this past weekend. The weather was gasping cold for our grandson's hockey tournament in Crookston. We've been looking forward to it for weeks now. Icy roads. Drifts. Currents flowed across the highway, twining, twisting streams of fine snow. Denis and I laughed as we passed miles and miles of buried fence lines. We were remembering that scene from the movie Fargo where the character played by Steve Buscemi buries a suitcase with the money in a snowbank and returned to his partner with only $80,000.00. The character stops his car along the highway, looks both directions, flounders through the snow, and buries the suitcase in a spot that is so like a billion other spots, we know he will never, ever find it again.

North Dakota power plant

The land makes you wonder about the early pioneers who made it to the Red River Valley in the fall, and before winter only had time to build a three-sided sod house in the lee of a hill - if they were so lucky to find a hill. Even in our warm car, it felt a little dangerous. When we left Grand Forks for home on Sunday morning, it was 26 below not counting wind chill.
My favorite app is the Starbucks Locator that can lead me to the closest store anywhere in the U.S. - the coffee I count on when traveling. Allowing the pulsing blue circle to lead us to the green light on the map, just over the hill and off the next exit always gives me a small jolt of pleasure. You may not know that my blog name "toadsdrinkcoffee" is not random. We live in Toad Hall, so I suppose you could call us Toadies and good coffee is a burden I gladly bear.

No buried treasure here

On that cold morning we found a Starbucks in Grand Forks before we headed south. Along the way I had fleeting thoughts of what it would be like to break down along the road. About 10 miles north of Fargo, we did. Suddenly the rpms dropped to zero and we coasted to a stop. Our engine was still running, but the accelerator wouldn't engage. These days with every insurance company carrying road-side assistance, we knew we'd be okay, but it made Denis very tense, while me, I'm just sitting there sipping my latte, dough-dee-dough. With the engine still alive, we stayed warm. After several calls someone in a far-away, warm climate called a towing service in Fargo, located our position via our iPhone and GPS, and after an hour's wait the tow truck arrived. As he towed us into a Firestone shop, he told us he had pulled 72 drivers out of the ditch that weekend. (There had been a strange sleet that fell making roads even more treacherous.) All of them idiots, he said. He didn't count ones like us who broke down. As we waited for the shop to open, Denis started the engine again and automatically touched the accelerator which suddenly woke up. We quickly decided to take the chance and head to Rochester. On the five hour drive home the engine cut out three more times. It was stressful for Denis, especially when it happened while we were in the passing lane surrounded by semis and me yelling, "Turn on the hazards! Turn on the hazards!" Shutting the engine off and restarting seemed to reboot the system. It's fixed now.
Winter has its bleak side, of course. But to be home safe? To be warm? More than sufficient.

In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan, 
 earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone; 
 snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow, 
 in the bleak midwinter, long ago.

Our God, heaven cannot hold him, nor earth sustain; 
 heaven and earth shall flee away when he comes to reign. 
 In the bleak midwinter a stable place sufficed 
 the Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ. 

Angels and archangels may have gathered there, 
 cherubim and seraphim thronged the air; 
 but his mother only, in her maiden bliss, 
 worshiped the beloved with a kiss. 

What can I give him, poor as I am? 
 If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb; 
 if I were a Wise Man, I would do my part; 
 yet what I can I give him:  give my heart. - Christina Rosetti

Time to change

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It is snowing this morning. The first day of “Daylight Savings.” Daylight Time used to change when Spring was firmly established in flowers and light. Today, ironically, it is still winter. Snow falls straight down in heavy-cotton chunks. Theirs is a quiet, passing beauty. The kind of snow-fall that doesn’t last. Quickly it fades to small flakes and then disappears altogether.

I am thoughtful this morning. Considering changes. Time, weather, place. What to make of unwelcome changes?

Yesterday, driving from Lincoln to Rochester meant passing through most of Iowa on interstate highways. First miles and miles east to Des Moines on I-80 and then up, up, north and north through the “fruited plains” on I-35 until at last the bluffs of southeastern Minnesota gently rise.

About thirty miles west of Des Moines traffic suddenly slowed, came to a stop. We could see the road ahead was clogged with cars and trucks idling in the rain. An accident.  Someone’s tragedy unfolding far ahead; who we would never know. As we approached the standing point, some vehicles were making a k-turn, passing us on the shoulder and exiting the wrong way up the on-ramp. One questioning glance from Anita, and we were doing the same. It was a satisfying crime. A justifiable change of direction. We quickly followed a line of traffic heading cross-country. Along the back roads, we had time to call up Google Maps and decided to follow the perfectly paved Iowa county roads, straight and smooth, skipping Des Moines and Ames altogether.

A map of Iowa hints at its history – a perfect grid of right-angle roads. Rich, black soil precisely divided into sections worth millions. One mile on a side, 640 acres within the square. Farmland that made the lives of men and women who raised crops and animals to feed hundreds of others. Often there is still a stand of old trees on one corner of a section, remnants of a homestead, a house that might still be lived in, if it’s lucky, but the out-buildings –  the out-buildings. All dying, sinking back into the ground. Barns three stories high with an elevator still sitting beneath the haymow door as if one day the farmer was raptured, or died or moved to Arizona. Round barns, barns with graceful cupolas, hipped roofs, angled roofs, stone, oaken, bricked, square, reflecting styles of German, Norwegian, Dutch immigrants.

Iowa barn in winter

Not as many of these places are seen from the heavily traveled interstate, but on back roads they never leave your sight. County after county the quiet is eerie. In the stillness of winter the machines are gone, the land is dark, the buildings are broken, blackened, faded red. Granaries, barns, coops without an animal or human in sight.

Perhaps one reason American factory farming troubles me is because I feel alienated by it. I want to be wholly restored to land and creation. I want us to be careful caretakers of, not just the earth, but of people. I mourn empty places that were once alive with chickens, cows, horses and pigs. I want to repopulate them with children and dogs and tire swings. Restore a garden. Perhaps it is true Home I wait for – that impossible place of meaningful work and unbroken restoration God will bring about one day.

Tomorrow, I will be more settled. More distant from dying places I can’t fix. I will focus on my desk and maybe I’ll think about the small patch of urban earth outside our back door. Flower and seed catalogs are here and we need a few more climbing roses and stone walls for them to thrive upon.

Everyone does ten of something these days

Ten Sounds I love mostly in winter

Snow whispering

The whomp of the furnace igniting

Radiators ticking

Coffee grinding

Pages softly turning

Denis’ footsteps on the stair

Bacon sizzling

English Sparrows chirping in the hedge (I've made my peace with them.)

An infant nursing

The east wind that howls in our bedroom window at night.

Look! Behind you!

I grew up on the largest lake in Minnesota – Lake of the Woods. I mean, excepting Lake Superior. Okay? I KNEW that. It’s on the Canadian border. Every spring something or someone goes through the ice. Our son, Jerem, lives up there with his family and he keeps me posted, as this is of great interest to me. This week he sent this which happened six miles out from shore. (These are my people.) I admit I’ve watched it about ten times. And laughed. Not in a mean-spirited way, but as from someone who dumped a polenta on the floor last night, and recognizes I’m one who in no way should be trusted to drive or fish on ice. Maybe shouldn’t be let in the kitchen, either. Or even use my computer as in, a couple days ago while trying to download a weather program (I LOVE weather) I copied all my applications twice, so now I have three of everything and thought: DRAG the extras to the TRASH. Yes. And in doing so found I had no applications whatsoever. Now luckily, clever me, I dragged them back out. And I think everything will be okay, but mymacman will see to it. But this poor guy, Chris, the owner of the vehicle, wasn’t so lucky. Even though another truck and a bombardier tried to drag him out, it was too late. One less Silverado to drive over the pressure ridge on Lake of the Woods!

There’ve been more sorrows around here (according to my reckoning) than I have time to cry for. Many of them belong to other’s lives, not our own. But then there was a text message recently, from a friend who’s way sweeter than most, well, at least than I - and she always begins “Dearest  Margie,” as if there’s no price on texting, and this one she ended with “Isaiah 35.” So, not remembering it exactly I looked it up. It’s a good, good chapter. It reminds us that one day we’re going to look behind us to see “sorrow and sighing flee away,” and “gladness and joy” running us down and finally overtaking us. I could stand that.

Meantime, I look at this pickup (not the same one as in the video) thinking some sorrows are stinkin’ and sure make you glad they’re not your own or at least cause you to evaluate your car insurance. And other sorrows we’re just meant to bear with others, because it’s part of what we do, carry the weight to the cross. It’s like a down-payment on their joy. Some day we’ll get to share theirs with them, maybe even get to eat some of their best chocolate, drink their finest wine. We, some day, might even get the truck back. We’ll see about that.

Frost

Today Anita and I drove back from St. Louis. We left in dreary fog and heavy damp. Hadn’t seen the sun since we’d left home. As we headed north we began to notice clumps of wild grass thick and luxuriant - their heads floating like feathers above the ditches. We wondered how they had remained so intact, so beautiful this late in the season. I wanted to stop and gather armfuls, but immediately deleted that thought. From northern Missouri on up through Iowa they grew and grew, until finally we noticed the bushes, trees, fences had begun to take on the same light fairy look. It was frost. By northern Iowa the ground was deep in snow with frost fanning out, coating every surface, even the highline wires. I said wouldn’t it be wonderful to drive into sun with all this? And then we did, like God said here you are. For perhaps 40 miles it flared across blue sky making such glory. During those miles with the sun we passed a magnificent bald eagle right beside the highway eating road kill. (Very undignified.) We turned around to try to get a pic and as we rolled down the window it slowly took off looking extremely annoyed. No, that’s not true, eagles always look annoyed. All of this – the beauty of creation. And tonight, the beauty of my own bed. Being home. Magnificent in its own way. Much to be thankful for, including a great board meeting. Though I might be more thankful if Denis were here. He stayed in St. Louis at Covenant Seminary to teach a J-term class: Film and Theology.

Winter Day at Toad Hall

It was almost achingly beautiful today. The sky in winter can be brilliant blue - only in New Mexico did we see skies so turquoise. There they were so common we complained. Longing for clouds and rainy days. Why are we never quite altogether happy with the weather? (no response, please, friends from Hawaii.) Is it just me? When it's this cold with temps way below zero we are exhilarated. Although I feel sorry for rabbits, I don't spare feelings for squirrels. The snow glints and dazzles. Each step is a crunchy squeak. Even the car tires squeak over the snow. Thought I'd share the photos Anita took around Toad Hall today. (I don't think I've quite figured out how to properly embed a slideshow. Sorry.)

Buried not dead

Despite the fact that the high today will be minus 15 degrees and anything even remotely related to the living growing earth seems hopelessly dead, I am reading The Gardener’s Year by Karel Capek. Perhaps I read about gardening in winter because of that very paradox – the paradox of life – that is rooted in resurrection and all that God is to us.

Capek writes: “The existence of gardeners who every year, in spite of these bad experiences with the weather, welcome and unveil the spring is therefore a testimony of the imperishable and miraculous optimism of the human race.” I was tucked up in bed, reading, and planning to slowly drift off with visions of crocus (pl. croci?) spronging through the earth, lilac buds swollen ready burst shock green, maples giving off their burgundy springtime haze before they dump tons of fuzzy flowers into our rain gutters and sidewalks when I heard a strange sound. Like a mouse-sized machine gun, ta-rrrrrp. Rrrrr-rrrr. Then it dawned; ripping fabric? Denis looked defensive and guilty. I heard it again and whipped back the covers to hear an extended salvo of tearing sheets caught on his wrist.

WHAT are you doing? I asked with every intention of blame, wondering how he could have done this since we’ve only had these particular sheets for maybe 18 months. True, I wash the same ones week after week and put them back on the bed month after month, and okay, maybe I do bleach them a little once in awhile, and also hang them in the sun so the infrared rays can weaken the fibers, but still. How could the top hem be so rotten he finally ripped the whole thing off and how was I supposed to sleep with frayed threads tickling my nose and stray bits getting caught in my teeth? So I tested the strength of the fabric a little farther down and easily poked my finger through. Denis tried it and easily made two more holes. I remember I bought those sheets at Penney’s and they claimed a 350 thread count. Cheez. How many threads do we need? For years I slept on about two threads per inch. Now I don’t know. Does every single thing we buy these days have to have built in obsolescence? We owned the last set for four years. Well, not exactly the very last. That was one Denis talked me into buying. Why would I trust him? He’s a little color-blind. Really, he is. No surprise they were the wrong color. I said so at the time. And then, I caved. A kind of rotten yellow-brown. Probably Burnt Custard or Golden Landfill. I couldn’t sleep in them. Every day they made me uncomfortable and even in the dark I knew I was sleeping in the wrong color. So I ended up giving them to our youngest daughter who likes them and probably calls them Soft Pumpkin or Amber Waves. I felt flawed and extravagant for getting, even though they were on sale, a new set.

At least one good thing can be said about the present economy, all the retail stores are practically paying us to buy their stuff. So I flung aside my schedule and went out to find a new set of queen sheets. I found one, really cheap. A good, peaceful color. I can sleep soundly in Marina Bay Green. And even though they are the texture of tent canvas, they blend with the Harvest Moon color of our bedroom walls … and I am dreaming of springtime, wrapped in sheets of leaves eagerly waiting.