But not *that* amazing. I mean, this married stuff is a lot of work. I think this year we both identified with the term “winter blues”. January and early February were rough. But that’s some of the joy…the rollercoaster of relationships. Sometimes I’m annoyingly crazy about her. Sometimes I just want to be left alone. I can either grind out the hard times (that really aren’t that hard). or….
So why are we still married? I’m not expressing regret. Not at all. But sometimes I wonder why?
And more infrequently I remember to approach that question with humility. In a way, so far so good.
But in other ways there is a lot of intentionality in our relationship. (Is that a word?) I work to make sure she feels appreciated. Let me give you an example. I’m sure you have read The 5 Love Languages. If not, close your internet and go now.
My language is physical touch. I can’t sit near enough to Julie. Some part of me has to touch her. I think one hand stays on her back or shoulder or hand while we sleep.
Julie wants quality time. Like eyes open, sitting across a table and …like…talking and listening and stuff. That’s like…work, man.
A lot has changed in 22 years. I have had lots of different jobs. Lots of different cars. Several different houses. I went from being the doer of the things to being the manager of the things. I shifted from dreaming of farming to embracing the economic opportunity in the workplace (but cows still make me smile). I barely remember having children in diapers. I have learned to relax more.
But I have also learned how to really work. And where this post is concerned, I have learned to work on my marriage. I am humble enough to say, “so far so good”. We are fallible people and the next year brings unknown challenges. Admittedly, there are some pretty rough spots from time to time. But I think we both agree that this deal is not 50/50. We both have to bring 100%. And it’s work. No matter how kind, intelligent, hard-working, funny or beautiful she is, some days I just don’t want anything to do with her. We have both learned to be attentive to that feeling, to break it down and to not let it fester. 22 years in and I’m still learning.
I love you Julie. 22 years. Still trying to learn all about you.
Please understand, I am telling you what we think the point is, not asking if there is a point.
So what’s the point?
I’ll tell you what it isn’t.
This isn’t some sort of contest to be the last couple on the dance floor. We aren’t married for the sake of being married.
I would suggest that we are married, in part, because we make daily decisions to deal with our problems. And we have problems. Boy do we have problems. The Communication Guys podcast recently featured a divorce attorney who talked about the need to deal with problems while they are still small. Julie and I deal with a lot of small problems. Some big problems too but the ones that needle at our relationship tend to be rather insignificant when you pause to take a deep breath.
But that may answer how we have stayed married. I didn’t ask that question. I asked “What’s the point?”
I have shared with you before why I married her. The most succinct answer I can give is I married her so nobody else could. I won. So there. But that doesn’t sustain a marriage. And marriage is hard. Why bother sustaining it?
What’s the point?
I guess I’m going to have to stop evading that question and take a stab at it. Keep in mind, I make this stuff up as I go along. I get the feeling that she does the same (but she makes it look easy). Also, I have to offer the disclaimer that this stuff may only work for Chris and Julie and it may only be good for 21 years of marriage. It isn’t over until it’s over. We haven’t hit 22 years yet. I’m not here to brag. Just to celebrate.
But what about this is worth celebrating? What’s the point?
Shoot. I did it again.
Is it possible that I stay married to Julie without justification?
Is it possible that this is just some meaningless drive to a trophy that will never be awarded?
Are we simply sustained by emotions we felt as children and fear of embarrassment or social pressure to keep this thing going for the sake of the children? Gosh, I hope not.
So what is it then?
Obviously I’m having trouble putting this into words. And I can only speak for Chris. You should know by now that, though he has known her since 1993, Chris has no idea what Julie is thinking…I mean, I know she is mad, I just don’t know why.
So I would have to say that Chris is married to Julie because Julie…
Look, this is kind of embarrassing.
Marriage isn’t the end goal. Marriage isn’t the point. But it also isn’t the means to an end. It’s like…it’s like …it’s like being married to Julie gives everything else purpose. I enjoy my job. I enjoy my kids, my farm and my dog. But I treasure sharing those experiences with Julie.
My kids will grow up and move out. Hopefully, they will live next door or, at least, very close. The dog won’t last forever. But I work every day to ensure that Julie comes to me for friendship, acceptance and affirmation. Heck, she can even come to me for food, shelter and safety if she wants. But those physical needs are easier to attain than love.
I love her. And I want to love her because I want her to love me.
And I think that’s the point. I love her because I want to love her. And I want her to love me because I love her.
I recognize that the above is circular.
And maybe that’s why it was hard to answer the question to begin with.
The point is that I want to. Even though sometimes I want to less than other times.
I was listening to a recent episode of the Read to Lead podcast this week and the guest was talking about the importance of reading. You probably aren’t too surprised by that, given the subject of the podcast is reading.
Guest Angie Morgan said you can’t argue that you don’t have time to read because we don’t have time to notread.
That was sufficiently profound that I felt prompted to write a blog post. A blog post on the blog where I spend a considerable amount of time talking about the farm by way of the books I am sharing with you.
I don’t have time to NOT read.
Why?
Because there is so much I do not know….too much I will never figure out or even think of without guidance. The depth of my ignorance is boundless. Reading does not alleviate me of the need for thinking for myself. Rather, it allows me the opportunity to catch up. Why do we ask the Muse to sing of the wrath of Peleus’ son Achilles? Because he brought so much pain upon the Achaeans. Because Achilles thought he wanted a short life and everlasting glory but, when later talking with Odysseus, changed his mind. He would have preferred a long life. Because we can see by their example how badly we can screw things up when responding to emotions rather than to reason.
Humans have shared read the works of Homer for 3,000 years. Is that by accident? I don’t think so.
Because I can’t tell the future.
I know very little about Neil Gaiman. I have seen his name on spines at the library and at book stores. Fortunately, the Milk is on our shelf and I suspect my kids know all about him. But I don’t. I have only read this article quoting him. Rather than quote the whole article, which you should read and consider, I’ll point out this sentence:
The Chinese were brilliant at making things if other people brought them the plans. But they did not innovate and they did not invent. They did not imagine. So they sent a delegation to the US, to Apple, to Microsoft, to Google, and they asked the people there who were inventing the future about themselves. And they found that all of them had read science fiction when they were boys or girls.
But I can influence the future, just as Gaiman says in the post above. I can raise my children to wonder at worlds that will never exist but are reflections of worlds that could be. I can help guide my children through these worlds, the concepts and consequences the writer is presenting. Jean Valjean was not real but his impact can be felt. Bilbo Baggins, like Luke Skywalker, was an unlikely hero with a glowing sword…but a hero nonetheless. Jean and Bilbo teach my children about doing what is right in spite of the cost in a way they can relate to where they are now.
Because I don’t want to screw this up.
Is that silly? Or obvious? I want to be a good husband. A good father. Even a good employee and citizen. I want to understand the historical definition of each of those roles and I find my way through them. Not only do I seek to understand how previous generations raised my fathers, I seek to know why. And what traps did they fall into that I can avoid? Because it’s not enough to turn infants into adults-sized bodies. I want to shape the minds trapped in those bodies. And I can’t do it alone. I have to rely on outside help. Marcus Aurelius’ great-grandfather said exactly this:
From my great-grandfather, not to have frequented public schools, and to have had good teachers at home, and to know that on such things a man should spend liberally.
While you can’t learn to swim from a book, we rely on the perspective and experience of a wide variety of authors to teach us. And we do spend liberally. Amazon gets a frightening portion of our budget. So does the library in the form of overdue fees but that’s another story.
Obviously my focus in on my home but it goes beyond that. After Julie and the kids, I spend the most time with my employees and co-workers. I can influence the future of the company by encouraging others to explore, learn and grow. It’s as easy as asking, “Hey, whatcha reading these days?”
The most typical answer is, “Nothing. I don’t have time to read. Hey, did you see that last episode of Zombies Murdering People? It was Awesome!”
No, man. I don’t have time to watch watch Zombies Murdering People. There is too much I don’t know…don’t understand and haven’t explored. In short, I am too stupid to watch Zombies Murdering People.
How about you? Whatcha reading these days?
Update:
I came down kind of hard on Zombies Murdering People and for that I am sorry. It may be that in 100 years we will look back on the various episodes of Zombies Murdering People and reflect on the changes the show wrought in the human spirit. It may prove to become a classic. But the odds are against it. Jefferson wrote that the US was better for its lack of printing presses compared to France. France had plenty of paper for the toilet but the US only printed the things that had proven their worth.
So I’ll offer Zombies Murdering People the benefit of the doubt and I’ll just let it be. And while its worth is measured I’ll occupy my time on tested and proven resources.
A year ago today (December 18) we were in surgery with our daughter to make the cancer go poof. I am delivering you an unedited video of Julie and I and a whole lot of anxiety in the waiting room at the hospital.
This is how we dealt with the strain. We drew close together. We laughed. We talked.
So here it is.
I hope it helps you in some small way.
If nothing else, pay attention to how tired and confused both of us are about various surgeries, dates and locations in the hospital. This was the halfway point of Wendy’s treatment and it was all a blur.
Remember the movie Better Off Dead? That movie is a family Christmas tradition for us. Lane Meyer has to ski a dangerous mountain to prove himself to Beth. He seeks advice and receives the most boiled-down help imaginable.
While entirely accurate, it is incorrect and Lane barely escapes injury.
I was talking to our children recently about the search for that special someone and I, too, fell prey to the temptation to reduce. Not wanting to embarrass my child on the internet I’ll begin this way, one of my children was found to be holding hands with someone…but they were way, way in the back of the group trying to express their affections without being “caught”.
Allow me to reduce the other mother’s response: shock.
From my perspective it’s no big deal. Immature. Silly. But no big deal. But it gave me an opportunity to boil relationships down to the minimum: Whatever else happens, don’t anger the mother. You will lose. Make her your ally…pursue real friendship with her. And if you find you don’t like the mother you will find you no longer need to pursue the child because, if things go according to plan, you will have to spend every Christmas with her for the rest of her life. And that may not be what you want.
Whatever you think of my guidance above, it is hardly adequate. But I do this with everything.
How to take a shower? Get wet all over and put specific emphasis on cleaning places where the skin folds.
How to drive a car? The pedal on the right goes, one on the left stops. The wheel keeps you from running things over. Let’s do this.
The majority of server issues boil down to capacity management or connectivity.
So I have this pattern I fall into of attempting to boil it down to the essence. What is trying to be done here?
That practice, in summary, fails when people are involved.
Let me give you another one and then I’ll give you a few more.
I tend to manage people by setting expectations and turning them loose. I don’t micro-manage. I expect my employees to learn the basics and grow from there by teaching others. Let me know if something comes up.
But that’s not enough because these are people we are dealing with!
I have successfully described the work that needs to be accomplished but nobody comes to work to do the work and get money. We come to work to be with people.
People who care about us. People we enjoy being with. People we can trust.
So there’s another reduction. I would suggest my job accomplishes several things all at once. My work is meaningful, it pays the bills and allows me to enjoy interacting with others.
There is a kernel of truth there but it misses so much subtle detail.
Or maybe it’s me. Maybe I’m missing the subtle detail.
I’ll typically arrive at work in the morning after most of my team has arrived. I’ll walk in and speak some song lyrics or something like, “You know, I don’t need dolla bills to have fun tonight…as long as I can feel the beat.” Two of them will look at me like they have no earthly idea what I just said. Another will laugh because I’m such a dork…but everybody loosens up a little we greet each other and then tie into work.
But I have already reduced the workey part. Let’s pretend I have a new employee named Larry. “Larry, each of your co-workers assume primary responsibility for a platform. They have created documentation so anybody else can do the work when they are on vacation. I need you to learn A, B and C in and out. But you won’t be primary on any of those. You are going to take on a new project. You are going be primary support, create the documentation about it and teach everybody else. Let me know if you have any questions. I’ma go over here and work on the things.
“Oh, and on Wednesdays we get together as a team to update project status and do some team training. In your free time I need you to learn all about technology X and teach it to us next month. I know you don’t know anything about it at all. In fact, I’m well aware that you have never even heard of this. My goal is not to make you look stupid in front of your peers, it is to expose our team to something new and help us to find better ways of doing our jobs. I can’t sift through all of the options on my own so we learn things together and discuss. I need you to be a part of that.
“Oh, and one more thing. If I catch you working evenings we’ll have to have a serious talk.”
I REALLY like that freedom. I have had at least three managers who worked that way. They gave me a lot of room to run, expecting me to just get my stuff done because I’m a grown-up. And, for the most part, I do. But it’s not for everybody. Some people need much more structure. So I interview for that. I honestly and completely lay out the culture, the environment and the expectations in the interview. We have fun, we learn how much we don’t know, we teach each other. We own our projects. And if their eyes pop out of their head I scratch them off the list.
My style is not for everybody. Sometimes people need each day planned out. They need to be told each step along the way.
I failed to discover this when I interviewed Julie and the kids.
I tend to give vague instructions like, “Please move the cows before noon.”
What I really mean is, “How are you feeling today? Look, I have to go to St. Louis today. I know it’s a bother but I need help with the cows. They cows are by the hog building. They are watering in the creek down the hill. Please set up a new grazing strip about 20′ wide to the East beginning at the hog building and going down to the bottom. Julie should carry the reel, oldest boy should set posts. As you are walking back, shift 40′ to the West and Julie should reel up the previous day’s rear fence while the boy collects the posts. Then leave any extra posts and reels in the SE corner of the grazing area. This should take you 15 minutes but give yourself 30 just in case. I really appreciate your help in this. The cattle are important to me but you are more important. This farm is important to me but we can put it aside if needed. I hope it is important to us. Maybe I can bring dinner home to make it up to you. I love you.”
It is not safe for me to assume they understand what my expectations are. Nor that they realize the most efficient way of getting it done. Nor that they won’t need discussion time to offer feedback. I just say, “Make the magic happen” and expect it to happen.
I had a boss named Rosie. She was a great boss. She was not technical so she relied on us to know how to fulfill the vision she gave. But she gave clear vision and she encouraged feedback. She didn’t say, “Go fast and turn”. She said, “Here’s the plan. Here’s where you fit. What do you think? Let’s go.”
Ugh. If only I could be more like that.
But I don’t even make time to talk to myself about why and how.
With the events of last year we were unable to raise replacement pullets. So right now, I have 100+ birds laying as many as 6 eggs/day. I know what needs to be done. There is no discussion. Nobody cares about feelings. Those birds have to die. We are already out of the egg business. That’s a fact.
But there is more. There are no replacements. There may never be. I have shown the kids the viability of the business model…when appropriately scaled and in partnership with other enterprises on the same resource base. And if they want to do it, they can. But if I am to put my resources to their highest and best use, I have to spend my time elsewhere. I can’t stay up all night hunting a skunk that is killing my birds and still answer tech calls at 2am and still show up at my desk ready to rock at 8. I am not 25 anymore.
There are more factors involved. I can no longer reduce it to “I want chickens so I have chickens.”
Reductionism only goes so far.
So I guess I should spell out what I’m trying to say. I do a fine job of reducing tasks to their essential points. But I should not be reducing people…because people are more complex than tasks. And I need to encourage feedback rather than just act like it’s all obvious.
I am willing to wash the dishes. I don’t want to do it but I am willing to so our house will be clean.
I want to eat a chocolate chip cookie. I’m totally willing to eat chocolate chip cookies too.
You down?
Let me bring it to the farm. Julie is willing to milk the cow but she doesn’t really want to.
This really is not about milking the cow. It’s certainly not about chocolate chip cookies.
It’s about that wide and disheartening gulf between the things we are willing to do and the things we actually want to do.
What does Julie want to do?
That’s a very important question.
It turns out, more and more, that what Julie wants is not to run a farm while I’m at work. So year by year there is less and less farm. We started butchering layers today and there is no replacement flock.
Why is that disheartening? Isn’t that a bit of a strong word?
Well, the shrinking farm is not disheartening. That’s a reality and a consequence of our daughter’s illness.
The disheartening part is watching Julie wither away as I impose my will on her.
…watching us grow distant as I want what she is only willing to do.
OK. So now what?
Now we address the problem. We make small adjustments to our routines.
We want chickens but we don’t want to wash 40 dozen eggs Monday morning. How about pigs? I love having pigs. But pigs on pasture cause her a lot of frustration. So I have to find simple solutions to the pig problem to make it as hands-off as possible…while still honoring the pig’s design.
And milking. Every year milking led to crying. And more crying. But not this year. And why? Because we realized that we don’t need 2 gallons of milk every day. More on milking another time.
I’m not as concerned about the kidlets as I am about Julie. They approach a number of chores only reluctantly and want to play video games. Part of the deal for them is doing things they don’t want to do. But what about me? What about Julie? Yes, we do a number of things we are willing to do but don’t really want to do. I drive away from the farm every day because it’s the best thing I can do for my family right now. But I don’t want to do it.
However, I see that differently than making Julie, who is a willing participant, do things she doesn’t want to do all day.
Because it leads to resentment if she is never allowed to do the things she just wants to do.
I am being vague here. I don’t want to share too much about my beautiful wife…putting her on display for all the internet to read. But mistakes have been made. And we are working to ensure they do not continue.
Take a moment to ensure that you and your other both want the same things. Ensure that you have common vision, not division.
The blackberries have been bright red for what feels like forever. They grow in the fence line which I climb over on my way to the barn so every morning the bright red berries stand out on the green leaves, saying, “Not yet, not yet”. But finally some of the red have turned dark and they are sweet to eat.
We did not plant these berries. We have not watered them. We have not done much for them. It is like free food. Until you start picking them and you are reminded that NOTHING is free. These plants don’t give up their fruit so easily, they bite as I pluck the sweet berries. They have thorns which seem to snag and sink into the skin and hang on.
But thorns or no thorns, we pick berries, usually as a family. The kids start out with great enthusiasm. But after the first few buckets it starts to get hot, fingers and arms get a little scratched (remember these are biting berry bushes), and there may be a pesky deer fly or two. But Chris and I cheer them on, “We only have to fill our containers, then we can go home.” The younger two might not make it. They often disappear to explore the nearby pond or go sit in the shade of the truck.
Finally our buckets are full. A drink of cold water, a shower and thoughts of blackberry cobbler with ice cream fill our heads as we pile into the farm truck.
The cobbler recipe I use comes from The Pioneer Woman. I love her site!
Pioneer Woman’s Blackberry Cobbler #1:
Ingredients:
1 stick of butter
1-1/4 cup sugar
1 cup self-rising flour
1 cup milk
2 cups blackberries (frozen or fresh, even better if you had to pick them yourself)
Preparation:
Melt butter in a microwavable dish. (We do not have a microwave, so we just melted the butter in a sauce pan on the stove top). Pour 1 cup of sugar and flour into a mixing bowl, whisking in milk. Mix well. Then, pour in melted butter and whisk it all well together. Butter a baking dish.
Now rinse and pat dry the blackberries. Pour the batter into the buttered baking dish. Sprinkle blackberries over the top of the batter: distributing evenly. Sprinkle 1/4 cup sugar over the top.
Bake in the oven at 350 degrees for 1 hour, or until golden and bubbly.
Serves 8
What is your favorite thing to do with blackberries?
Cows are in the barn these days. The pasture is a little behind and I want to give it a moment to rest. The summer sun is unbearably hot so we are grazing the cows on open, flat ground during the night then returning them to the barn in the morning. That way they are still getting fresh greens but they are also protected and have easy access to fresh water. Finally, it makes pinkeye treatment a snap. Salt and kelp are in the feed trough and we can easily spray the infected eyes without fear of a multi-acre rodeo. It is costing us a little hay right now but I think it is worth it.
All that to say, chores are pretty easy these days. So Julie and I kissed the kids goodbye for a short anniversary getaway.
Did you know we live next to my parents and near to hers? Yup.
Julie and I are currently (as I write on July 4) in Anna, IL at the Davie School Inn. We have a big classroom all to ourselves. King-sized bed, couch, giant bubbly bathtub and even a kitchenette with real dishes!
One of the exercises is to write about what is around you in detail. We had dinner tonight at the Rustle Hill Winery. Julie had a glass of sweet chambourcin as we sat overlooking the water.
Julie wrote the following while we enjoyed our dinner:
The sky is overcast but I can still feel the sun coming through the clouds. The chairs are of black iron – yours was broken in the seat. You exchanged it for one at the next table, fearing it would snag your jeans.
There is a small group of people on the balcony chatting and laughing. I can hear frogs creaking – sounds like rocks being struck together, crickets, a few birds chirping, light jazz music in the background and far away a soft thunder boom – must be fireworks.
There is a brick patio under my feet, a small decorative pond next to us, a larger pond down the hill. The hill is neatly mowed with a few trees sloping down to the pond below. I can see the rows of grape vines on the top of the next hill.
The restaurant is empty except for the group upstairs. I wonder if it is the family who runs the vineyard or the employees.
They had events here Saturday and Sunday – the restaurant has a laid-back feel. I wonder if they are all exhaling after a very busy weekend.
Even the menus looked tired with a “N/A” sticker covering many of the selections. I don’t mean tired in a run-down kind of description, but more of an exhaling, like a well-deserved rest.
That is somewhat edited from what she wrote in her journal but that’s it. She misspelled some words, crossed through others but that doesn’t matter. What do you think? Can you see it? Were you there with us? Did she succeed in taking you to Rustle Hill Winery on July 4th at 5pm? Can you taste the sweet glass of chambourcin? Could you hear acris crepitans chirping next to us?
Maybe. Maybe not. But Julie is trying. And if you want to learn to write you have to write…and you have to write every day.
One of my initial goals with the blog was to write daily and I succeeded for a long, long time. I began by imitating the style of writers I enjoyed. Now I seem to have found my own rhythm.
But I think it is time for me to grow again. It is time for me to be challenged further. It is time to improve as a writer. (and the people said, “Amen”.)
It is a little bit like work.But the act of writing is itself an escape…one that does not require willing grandparents or long trips in the car.
What did you write today? What is holding you back?
Jean Valjean paid 19 years of his life for stealing a loaf of bread. 19 years in the prison and in the galley. A slave. He emerged a bitter, angry man in an unsympathetic, unforgiving world. It wasn’t until he stole from a priest that Jean Valjean experienced love. His life was forever changed.
Julie married me but did not enslave me. Quite the opposite. Julie gave me love and acceptance and forgiveness. Julie filled an emptiness…satisfied a need. I married Julie and my life was forever changed.
It is counter to our culture for me to equate my marriage with freedom. We typically refer to our mates in disparaging terms and to continue with the prison example we may refer to a spouse as “the old ball and chain.” In our media husbands are presented as dopey, wives as narcissistic. Why did that self-obsessed woman marry that idiot?
I joke sometimes that Julie married me because I am intelligent enough to get a good job and dumb enough to go to it every day.
But that is not fair to either of us.
I was twenty when we were married. Looking back 19 years I can’t define what, specifically, I was looking for in a spouse. We dated for years. It was pretty casual. She was intelligent, pretty and shared similar values and family culture. But that describes other girls too.
Could I have married any of those other theoretical women? Maybe. But Julie and I selected each other. I can’t tell you why. But I would suggest to you that I would not be “me” if I had married anyone else.
I can also tell you it has been wonderful.
My reference to Les Miserables is finished. There really is no further comparison. No person from my past hunting me down to reveal my true identity. Julie knows everything about me.
There is no effort to fulfill a vow, protect the innocent and sacrifice myself for the sake of others. Oh. Well. There is that, isn’t there.
I vowed to love, honor and cherish her. Richer or poorer, in sickness and in health. Forsaking all others.
Honor is an interesting word…as in, “Honor your father and mother that you may live a long, full life…”
Respect is earned. I respect my chainsaw. It can kill me. Julie can kill me too but that’s no basis for a relationship.
I honor my wife. Not because of what she did but because of who she is. She is my wife.
But what does “Honor” mean?
It means I hold her up. It means she is special to me. It means I take time in my day to tell her how important she is to me and how lost I would be without her. Her. Specifically her. It means I am patient. It means I listen. It means I consider her needs, her wants, her dreams. It means I take time to find out all I can about her…who she is…today.
The woman I am married to today is not the girl I married 19 years ago.
But I am not the same either. And we have suffered through things I never imagined we would go through.
I am more free now than I was when we were kids. I am loved now in a way I was not loved then. I am able to love in a way I was unable to love then.
Julie has been married to me for fully half of her life. That’s kind of a big deal.
And it’s the kind of a big deal I don’t take for granted.
I can respond to the title in one sentence but that’s not what we do here. I have to use 1,000 words. Bear with me, please. You know I like to talk.
Last year I kept a reading journal on the blog. My reading journal continues, I just don’t share it with you. I wrote out a list of books I wanted to read/re-read on January 1. Here is the list:
Do you know what I did with that list? I read some, I put others aside for another time. I appended to the list. Good Profit and Superforecasting seemed, at the time, to be impactful but I would have a hard time telling you what they were about without flipping through the pages again. Landscapes & Cycles was preaching to the saved and I set it aside. Lean Farm and I couldn’t seem to meet up. High Output Management continues to challenge me. Louder and Funner was quietly hilarious and somewhat accusational. I have read enough of Wodehouse that when I re-read Malabar farm I heard the narrative in the voice of Stanley Featherstonehaugh Ukridge, bragging that he was asked to speak at the meeting but had declined because he was too busy with the farm, old horse.
So what happened to MacBeth or Republic? Were those failures?
Maybe. Kinda. But mostly I think I got the idea of the first 100 pages of Republic then decided that now was not the right time. And that is true of a good number of books I run into. Today’s Chris Jordan doesn’t need that book. Tomorrow’s might though. I have never read the Lord of the Rings trilogy, for example. Look, I know. I get it. But they don’t seem to scratch an itch.
Is this failure? Maybe. But not the kind of failure we are looking for.
BTW, my current active stack (piled to my right) includes:
The book Turn the Page discusses the importance of reading several books at once and finding connections between them, discovering ways reading one book impacts your thoughts of another. How will Algorithms to Live By impact Tale of Two Cities? I dunno. It may not.
But Turn the Page also talks about the importance of sampling many books and setting the majority of them aside. Also, the author of Turn the Page is a bit of a bore, referring to himself in third person and constantly quoting himself in bold print.
Chris Jordan thinks the author of the book Turn the Page is a bit of a bore, referring to himself in third person and constantly quoting himself in bold print.
If you read the book you’ll understand that joke. There are some good things in the book but you have to get past the writing style.
So what is this all about, Chris? Why are you sharing this with the world? Why are you, who just finished bragging about how humble you are and what a complete flop you are as a farmer, now list out the books you haven’t read? What is the point?
If I were to ask you, “What do we grow on our farm?” you might answer, “Well, Chris, you seem to have cattle and chickens. Sometimes pigs. There are bees out there somewhere but you don’t talk about that much. I guess you grow hay. Your dad has horses. So…is that what you want? Or are you looking for a more clever answer like, “money”. That’s the answer Henry Galt gave the judge when asked what he farms.”
You are not technically wrong. We grow grass. There are cows. Those things are here. And, yes, we pay a little tax on a very little income each year. But that’s not what we do here.
We grow people.
Our farm is a ministry more than anything. It’s about people.
And not just the six of us.
Jesus boiled life down to two simple tasks:
Love God
Serve People
Cows are a fun extra.
I can’t make you grow. I can’t make you read my blog. But the hope is that you, reader, will happen across my blog and I will grab your attention long enough to plant a seed. I tell you about the things I wrestle with. I tell you what I am reading and thinking and enjoying and experiencing. I ask you to celebrate when our marriage survives another year. I ask you to cry with me about our daughter’s illness. I ask you to share my burden when I lose a calf through ignorance or inaction. I embrace you as a part of my extended family. I want to hear about your struggles. I want to read what you are reading.
So I lead by example. I write about the things that make the farmer. ..the things that make the marriage. …the things that make the family. …the things that add meaning to our lives.
We home school our children but we don’t do school at home. There are no classrooms, no desks, no ringing bells. No schedule. We read. They read. We discuss. They participate. We sell farm products. They stand beside us at every step.
I write about my reading list in the same way. I think this is how I can serve you. I scatter seeds. Life is not easy, on the farm or in town. My days are long. I get tired. Julie gets tired. We work through difficulties together. We read books together. We walk through life together. My post about humility and failure was not seeking sympathy from my small group of readers/friends. I was sharing. This stuff is hard. Someone recently told me that I make everything look easy. I am, indeed, very blessed. But it is not easy. I meant that post to be an encouragement to the reader. This stuff is not easy. But I continue to plug away, trying, failing, trying again. Failure, we learned in church this weekend, builds faith.
Chism Heritage Farm 