the z, y, x's of life "S" soil

these 26 entries from z-a are meant as a tandem collection of short essays.  instead of the abc's of life, i'm writing backwards for two reasons.  t.s. eliot said that to make an end is to make a beginning, which i find true.  that and my grandfather could say the alphabet backwards faster than i could say it forwards.  now that's some wit.

don't give me diamonds and roses, give me dirt. specifically soil and i'm a happy woman.  

some women might swoon over a new wardrobe, whereas i feel intoxicated feelings of love when i come upon an unexpectedly open vista of a freshly-tilled field (a john deer tractor parked to one side nicely completes this fantasy).  

another title for this post could easily be "in praise of loam" but i'm too impatient to wait until "L" so soil will have to do.

honestly, modern life leaves me feeling malnourished; hungry for nutrients beyond the surface of an over-worked insta-culture topsoil that has nothing left to give.  i've heard of mineral-deficient persons literally eating dirt and that's how i suppose my soul feels.  how far into the ancient layers must we dig?

if you are fortunate, as i am, to live near this scintillatingly luscious scape of striped soil the color of coffee grounds being turned up on patchwork quilts near red clover, lavender, and oak trees, then you know how deeply one can luxuriate in simply breathing.  and how well we can eat, both body and soul.

i come from a long line of farmers and general lovers of the land.  on a recent day trip with my parents we stood in front of a field and my father said quietly, "oh, i do love watching the waves of light on fields of grass when it is blown by the wind."

at age four i am found in glen's corn patch.  having wandered off while the adults were visiting, parting the sea of husk and leaves like a swimmer, until i could no longer hear their voices, i sat down to wait.  glen, his gleaming white smile creased and laugh lines to match the texture of his coveralls.  equal parts gardener and jokester.

as surely as dad found me, i rode high on his shoulders that day, above the tallest tassels.  when he sat me back down on the warm earth it was to an array of garden produce cradled in glen's calloused hard-working hands.  i have yet to see bigger, healthier, or more colorful produce--even the markets of aix en provence were pale in comparison to the canadian farm.

our first experiences stay with us.  what is it you most love now?  can you trace it back to an early memory or interest; someone who loved you taking time to introduce you to it?

i am nineteen, sitting around a campfire with gerald, a younger form of glen in the cole family line, who can still hear wind through the firs, unaided.  our coffee is simple, strong and black.  he has the same laugh lines and creases, the same turned-up corners of his mouth.  his eyes bright in equal measure to the sparks from our fire.

even thirty years ago i was becoming aware that not all tomatoes taste the same.  that the produce i found in even the "natural" section of the grocery store was a far cry from glen's garden.  sometimes even, when i bit into a tomato is was mealy and tasteless, sadly more like styrofoam than sunshine.  

watching documentaries such as "food, inc" about the industrialization of farming confirmed my suspicions.  in coming years i will read wendell berry poems but have already been introduced to gerard manley hopkins ("and for all this nature is never spent...") and i'm listening.

listening to a generation no longer alive, i remember gerald telling me the secret of letting land rest.  that ultimate not only profitability but wholeness comes from from time plus depth over the long haul.

where we come from, land is on the square and neighbors know one another, farm to farm.  farmers laughed at gerald the first time he let his land rest.  but they stopped laughing when his outproduced theirs at least ten to one over the years. i admire what i now see as his choice of the patient, long, and loving path forged of a certain generosity.  

organic is hip now, and just as expensive as it is popular--to make a return to practices so utterly simple and completely natural that have been practiced for hundreds and thousands of years.  

do we have the courage to make a return?  to take our time? to let things rest?  nature will provide if we care for her.  

meanwhile, i feast on the best produce i can grow or find.  as well as ancient traditions wherever i find them, digesting all the wisdom i can, cramming generations of topsoil into my system, mouth caked with metaphorical mud.  

my heart still leaps at loam, as does my soul at generations of fertile soil.