All The Ones Who Have Gone Before

There’s a certain smell in the air this time of year. It’s accompanied by the special way that the sunlight hits the late afternoon after moving to Daylight Savings Time. Early in my life this meant afternoons outside on the ball fields, hitting, catching, laughing with teammates, loving everything except for the running. I’ve never been fast, but I’ve been strong, bred from peasant stock, no doubt.

Now the ones who’ve gone before me speak through the dirt and the rain, the wind and the sun. In my tragedies and failures in the field, my grandfather, whose body returned to dust a while back, tells me that I’m doing it wrong, but then laughs at my stubbornness. My work and joy is built upon the backs of those who labored to survive and live better lives. We reap the fruit of their trees. 

Today I struggle to remember the things that I was taught, but too disinterested to keep. That kid was too busy being cool, or maybe just trying to keep cool from the 100 degree Southern summer heat. With each passing year, I understand more the what and the why for how my grandparents lived. The words of my parents and the old folks at the church make more sense now. When you’re young there are certain necessary stupidities that you must pass through, attitudes and raging, like a sailor out to sea willing to risk the tumultuous weather just to make it back home to his shores. You’re an idiot, but determination is on your side. Having survived those choppy waves, the water is now more predictable and stable. Patience is now the thing that moves you along. Mortality is more reality than far off possibility. 

Finally sober and free, I know less now than I did then. The soil leaves more to be explored than ever before. There are creatures and ecosystems and living and dying happening all around, even in the air. It’s here that I’m humbled, finally realizing that control was mostly an illusion. We work, we toil, we fight to produce better things. All of this is necessary, but only the Creator can bring forth the rain. In mere moments, years of labor can be erased. 

Contentment comes with loving fierce, but holding loose. When I’m tending to the plants, or walking through the forest, I’m forced to confront the realities I’d rather not face. Nothing is equal and nothing is fair, at least not by the judgement of humanity’s scale. All that’s left in the end is trust … and maybe hope. I trust that eventually it will all be restored. I trust that there will be a day when the toiling stops. I hope in things eternal. My hands in the dirt remind me while the gentle winds whisper the faith of the ones gone before.