Ode to My Water Carrier

This is the man who fixes everything in my life. From cars to bad days, he can usually fix it all. But one thing I have learned about Matt in the last few weeks is that he will carry water for me. No matter what. (These are the important things you find out about someone when wells go out.) He has to drive to the dairy down the road just to get that precious water. The water just appears without my asking for it and when it is gone, it is replenished. He will get up early just so there is water there when I get up.
Seriously... the best way to show love to someone is to serve them with a cheerful heart.

This is a man who carries water for me...how sexy is that?

"Work is LOVE made visible."

-Kahlil Gibran

The Reading Continues

Book # 10 of 2010 is...

Plain and Happy Living: Amish Recipies & Remedies

by Emma Byler

This book explains how to live simply as the Amish do daily. I bought this book last summer on a trip to Crossville, Tennessee with Becky and her family at an Amish store, but I haven't really sat down to read it until now. I thought this book might give me some ideas about how to do dishes, laundry, and cook without running water...since I am still living without that lovely amenity. I was right, the first chapter ("Running a household on next to nothing") goes into detail about how to clean, wash and cook with literally next to nothing! As Amish woman, Emma Byler says, "Not having money meant that we couldn't just go to the store to buy things we wanted...we had to make do with what we had...for medicine, gardening, housekeeping, and caring for our animals." Emma has a quick cure or fast relief for nearly everything that ails her family, along with old family recipes for everything from homemade soap to Amish wedding punch. It was a great reminder that simpler is often better, and these old ways were things that EVERYONE once knew how to do to live. I am so glad that I bought this book on that fun trip!

The Reading Continues

Book # 9 of 2010 is...

Five Quarters of the Orange

by Joanne Harris (author of Chocolat)

This book was nothing like I thought it would be when I started it. It takes place in a small French village during the occupation of World War II. The story is really the murder mystery of a German SS officer that unravels up to the very last page. The tale is told by the protagonist, a nine year-old girl, who from the very beginning makes it clear to the reader that she is somehow mixed up in the whole mess. This was a really good story that keeps the reader in suspense right up to the end.

Morning Has Broken

"Where there is great LOVE

there are always MIRACLES."

- Willa Cather

"This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins...God is love. Whoever lives in love, lives in God, and God in him. In this way, love was made complete among us." -1 John 4:10 & 16, 17

Happy Easter Everyone! The day the stone was rolled away and the tomb was found empty was the day when death lost its victory forever. This has always been my favorite holiday for that reason. Who is scared of death when there is a resurrection? Great love equals miracles! Thank goodness!

The Reading Continues

It is Easter break, and I have been busy reading!

Book # 7 of 2010 is...

The Big Rock Candy Mountain

by Wallace Stegner

I finally finished this saga! It was a good story and well told...and it spanned a woman's whole lifetime. She lived through a rough childhood, a mis-matched marriage, praire droughts, poverty, a bootlegging husband, wealth, the Great Depression, poverty again, raised two boys, buried one...and all the while she is full of love and a source of strength for her family. This was a good, but long, book.

Book #8 of 2010 is...

A Year in Provence

by Peter Mayle

THIS BOOK WAS WONDERFUL! In fact I read it in one day (it's only 207 pages). This is a book that is so full of juicy descriptions of French food that it made me HUNGRY while read it. It is about a man and his wife who realize their dream by moving to a 200 year old farmhouse in Provence, France and how they learn to live the simple country life among small town characters who live by the seasons and not by days. This is a book everyone should read.

I'm a REAL pioneer!

Yes, it is true...this week I have been living a dream! Well, sort of...

On Monday, our well (and the life-giving water that it pumps) stopped working. I don't know all the actual technical stuff, but the long and short of it is that we are going to have to drill a NEW well and this may take awhile.

Turns out, water is really, really important. In fact, upon some deep reflection on the subject, I think that indoor plumbing is perhaps the only real difference seperating the civilized from the rest of the world. And I promise here and now to NEVER take it for granted again.

We are showering at the gym, which sort of makes one feel homeless...but we are thankful that we have it as an option. We are doing laundry at Matt's Aunt and Uncle's house. They are SO kind to let us do HEAPS of laundry there, and entertain us while we wait for it to be done. But the real FUN comes when you need to flush a toilet, or fill the dog and cat water bowl, or DO THE DISHES.

At first the dishes were just backing up while we waited to see if the well could be fixed (why panic, just wait a day or two and clean everything up when the water comes on.) But today we got the verdict and had to come up with a new plan. I closed my eyes...and suddenly, I was the pioneer that I've always wanted to be! Matt brought me buckets of water (not from the creek out back, like we joked with each other about, but from the dairy down the street) and I started heating it up on the stove. Then I washed dishes in the sink and rinsed them in more scalding hot water. Let me tell you nothing brings back civilization like some hot soapy water! I have also learned how to wash my face in a wash basin (okay,okay, a bowl in the bathroom filled with more heated up water) and to flush my toilet with a bucket of water. It has been a big day. I know, I know, I'm far from cooking over a fire or sewing my own clothes, but it will be fun being a pioneer (sort of) for awhile.

And do you know what else I have learned today? That even though living like a pioneer is A LOT more work than living in 2010, there is a lot of peace in the work. Having to wait for all that water to heat up really gives you time to count your blessings.