Newsletter 4/30/20

Updated: 4/30/20

Greetings Friends and Neighbors,

What happens when the beauty that surrounds you begins to build up and applies a mounting pressure upon your ability to proceed through your daily routines? How does one keep the Flood Gates of Gratitude closed long enough to get through the day’s list of must-do’s? In other words, how might I begin to start extending Thanks and Praise to all those who have Given and Received Gifts these past weeks and thereby Blessed this little patch of ground along the Brush Brook?

The best I can do is to offer a little story that might make you laugh or it might make you cry. Or both. Or neither, for that matter.

Here’s what you’ll find in this letter:

1. Story – The Flood Gates Open
2. Invitation – This week’s Bread Gift Distribution Details

With Great Care,
Adam and the Brush Brook Community Farm Crew

Story – The Flood Gates Open

Monday means catching up on bookkeeping, and so I parked the car in front of the Post Office to collect the mail. I don’t leave the Farm much these days, so this trip was my highest Covid exposure risk of the week. A steady, cold rain ran down the car windows as I sat there and sorted the mail. I opened card after card addressed to Brush Brook Community Farm. These cards contained so many Generous Words and Gifts, and soon enough the Flood Gates could no longer hold and I found myself weeping at the magnitude of all the kindness and beauty I had experienced over the past weeks. I don’t get to cry often, and so this was no little sniffle. Waves of wrenching sobs sent tears and snot streaming down my face and running from my chin. But here’s the catch. I had just touched potentially-contaminated doorknobs and mail, so I couldn’t wipe my eyes or nose. There was no stopping the flow. My work jacket, already flecked with manure and mud, was now soaked and puddling, and then all the sudden I was laughing, in awe at the sheer beauty and grief and even humor of it all. Sitting in the car outside the Post Office in the rain. Some minutes passed there in the car, crying and laughing both, waiting for the windshield to de-fog and for my blurry eyes to clear enough to see the road back home.

Thank you for showing up to receive a Gift. Thank you for passing the Gift along. Thank you for considering, with us, the possibility that community might be worth the trouble at a time when troubles mount by the hour. Outside the window the Ewes are calling to their Lambs, asleep nearby in the sun. In the sky overhead, old Crow persistently pesters perturbed Raven with acrobatic aerial pursuit that might be grievance and might be play. The first Dandelion flowers bring tentative cheer to the steadily greening pasture. May the magic of Springtime gather around you in the days ahead.

Invitation

Bread Gift Distribution

All bread will be offered without charge.
Friday 5/1, 4:00pm – 6:00 pm

Brush Brook Community Farm & Running Stone Bread
4582 Main Road, Huntington VT.

Look for the new Brush Brook Community Farm sign when you arrive, which marks the entrance for parking and pickup.

Bread varieties this week: Mountain Bread, Polenta, 3 Seed, Rye, Sprouted Grain, Backcountry Loaf(gf)

Would you consider coming by for bread for your household,
and possibly one to drop off to someone who might appreciate it?

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