My Calling; a Partially fictionalized Journey to Survival
As I sit here watching the last embers of my life, I look at all that's been accomplished right here on this little piece of land. Through the years I have both cursed and wept as it seemed the land would win. Other times, I have thanked God for the opportunity and the challenges that He has presented me with through the years. There have been times when I have questioned my choices. There have been times when I have felt more burdened then blessed. In the end, I am left with the one thing that has always kept me going. It was given to me when I was just a girl growing into womanhood. I haven't always embraced it but I have never doubted from where it came. It has been with me for so many years now that I have taken to calling it MY vision but what I really believe is that it is HIS vision that I (and others) have been entrusted with to fulfill.
I'm old now and I've seen too much suffering but there WAS a time when I was young and full of hope and strength. I'm no longer strong in body. The day to day living is slower and more tiring. Its past time to let the next generation take the reins. I am satisfied that I have fought the good fight but I feel the need to share what brought us all here. So, I have decided to share the Vision and how it has been my calling.
In order to explain it, I have to go all the way back to when it was given to me. I hope you won't mind the meanderings of an old woman. Its been many years and sometimes its hard to explain a lifetime without a few sidetracks and rabbit holes. We'll get there eventually, I promise.
When I was a girl of just eighteen I didn't feel I was any different from any of the other girls I knew. Maybe I was more of a loner and more inclined to books amd seriousness but there was nothing particularly remarkable about me. I had my share of admirers but most of them were no more remarkable then I was. I had my group of friends and while I wasn't wildly popular I wasn't exactly unpopular either. Eventually, at eighteen, I did meet my future husband and we began to make plans to get married.
His family owned a farm and the two of us would go there and walk through the woods which would some day be his. I would even go on Saturday mornings and help him and his Dad cut wood. I was raised a city girl but I had always enjoyed work and nature. While they would cut, I would load the trucks with the logs ready for splitting and stacking.
On one particular fall morning, I had just finished loading the trucks and they decided to take them up to the house and unload them. Rather then riding with them I decided to take a break and sit on a log in the woods to wait until they returned. That was the morning that my whole life changed.
While I sat there, it suddenly got quiet as if the entire woods were standing still. It seemed to get warmer even though it was a brisk fall morning. The birds and squirrels were silent. Even the light breeze seemed to stop. The creek stopped its quiet running. It seemed like I was the only living being on earth and I began to wish I had not stayed there by myself.
Then the hair on my neck stood up and I KNEW I was not alone. I quickly stood up and turned around and there behind me was a man who wasn't old yet but was well past middle age. He was dressed in clean work clothes but they were from another time. He didn't speak but I knew what he was saying to me. I FELT him saying "come see". What I actually did was.....RUN. I tore up the hill and out of those woods like the devil himself was at my heels. My heart was pounding and my neck was on fire. When I got to the edge of the woods and the clearing that opens up I stopped dead in my tracks.
What I saw there was nothing I had ever seen before. I had just come through there a few hours before and it was a simple empty pasture. Now it was transformed into a campground. If I'm honest I would have to say it was a shanty town of tents, campers, wooden cabins and tarps. Walking around were people in clean but threadbare clothes. Most were barefoot and everyone was thin and work worn. There were young and old people but as they turned to look at me they all had old and tired eyes. They spoke to each other as they went about their lives but they didn't speak with audible voices. I simply KNEW what they were saying and thinking and I also knew that they recognized me. They had been waiting for me and they knew I was there. One woman in particular "spoke" to me. She had on a long skirt and an old tank type top. Her hair was pulled back in a tight long ponytail. She looked at the man who was still beside me and then she said to us both, "where have you been? what took you so long?"
Then I heard the trucks returning and I looked towards the driveway. I began to shake and I turned back around to look back at the man. He lifted a hand and just stared back at me. I felt him saying "we have waited for you" and when I looked away again he and the campground were gone.
I rushed to meet the trucks and I was thankful when I was told that it was time to knock off for the morning because lunch was ready. I hopped in the truck beside my future husband and he asked what was wrong because I was pale and nervous. I told him I had just gotten spooked down there in the woods by myself. He laughed and told me that everybody thought it was spooky down there and even his dad wouldn't stay down there alone. I didn't tell him what I saw. We rode back to the house in silence to eat lunch before splitting and stacking the wood.