Green Tribe of Belonging

 We know that in many ways, patterns in later adult life are shaped by the environment we had as children. Even though we might decide to rebel against our upbringing when we grow up, we may notice many years later that some fundamental things stay with us. What I've been realizing about my own early years is that they shaped me into being most at home in the outdoors. I grew up on a big Iowa farm, and all my free time was spent exploring and playing in the many landscapes a farm provides. When I was not in school, I was with my cousin John, who lived just across a couple fields from our big farmhouse. We climbed trees, rafted down the Wapsinonac Creek, rode on the hay wagon as the crop was coming into the barn. We made hideouts in the "haymow", skated on the pond, sledded down the hills. I quietly crept into the chicken house to gather eggs and watched little pigs being born in the pig barn. In the mornings, I heard my dad getting up early, whistling, buckets clanking as...

It's been a busy couple of weeks here at Prairie Hill. Yet I'm told that a blog needs to post at least every two weeks. So here's something I wrote awhile back but never posted. Nice to have something like this as a back-up!   On this January Sunday morning, I had the pleasure of waiting at the front of my home for a ride to Friends Meeting. There was a thick fog, the temperature was mild, and it had not decided to start raining yet. The trees around our community stood out exquisitely from the fog. They had beautiful, intricate forms, all different shapes set against the horizon. I could have stood there for far longer, marveling at the beauty. And then when I got to Friends Meeting, the tree theme continued. As I was settling into the silence, I looked around me and found that there was wood everywhere. The benches we were sitting on were made of wood, old fashioned plain sturdy benches with wooden pegs to hold them together. And the floor under my feet was made of wooden...