This Thursday, Elijah left for his first day of full-time employment. Moms get misty watching their 5 and 6-year-olds toddle off with lunchboxes and backpacks for their first day of school, I admit to mist as I watched my 17 ½ year old leave the house with his giant insulated lunch pack (he is 17, after all) and drive away. I feel remarkably blessed to have spent nearly every day of those years nearby, to have been able to guide and to witness the spectrum of his transformation from a little round baby boy, to a young man ready to take on adulthood. It has been an honor and a joy.
I remember being a young mom and going to the extra effort to drop my husband off at work in the early morning so that I could attend a La Leche League meeting. I was feeling a little isolated at home and was hoping to meet like-minded women and enjoy some adult conversation. I found the meeting place and apologetically squeezed myself and Elijah into the only (and very slim) remaining spot on a couch in the leader’s living room. The mini-lesson lasted about 45 minutes and then the leader opened the remaining time for socializing or one-on-one questions. I hate small-talk with a passion, but recognize that it is typically a necessary evil to get to the meatier stuff on the other side, so I probably prepared my face with a smile and my mind for fluffy exchanges, but even that was not to be. The woman on my right turned to the women on her right, the woman on my left to the women on her left and they started talking to eachother immediately. I looked around the room, still smiling and hoping to catch someone’s eye, but it was the same everywhere—everyone appeared to be engaged with someone else and it was all appearing pretty hopeless—until I looked down. Elijah was sitting on my knees, facing me. He must have picked up on my expression, because he was looking up at me with his eyes wide open and a bright, expectant smile on his face. I bent down, smiled back at him, and we un-wedged ourselves and went home. Home is a pretty great place when there are such great people in it.
Garden news—we appear to have baby lettuces and some peas coming up, I am not sure about anything else as there are a lot of weeds in the mix as well. Bethel and I put in one bed of strawberries on Friday. They were not labelled so I am not sure if they are the June-bearing or Everbearing variety—anyhow, I am hoping to get the other batch in early this week. I also planted our third garden bed yesterday with radishes, parsnips, Brussels sprouts, artichokes and chard. My layout is silly and planning is next to zero, but we are in the phase of just throwing things in and hoping something will work out. Next year, or maybe even the fall garden will be better. Right now I am really wishing that we had irrigation down there. The rain is a little inconsistent for seedlings and the canals probably won’t have water until the end of the month!
We also really need to figure out fencing. We will really miss having Elijah around for that project. Isaiah and Bethel will just have to burly-up.
Consecration Acres 