groundwork

This is the first Summer living in my childhood home since I moved out 24 years ago. It’s special to get to be here. So many memories to be remembered that would stay forgotten if I weren’t here.

When I was a girl summer weekends meant hard work. The yard would be mowed, the garden tended, and the house cleaned. Then the best part came in the evening.

A good meal and enjoying our rest after the day’s work. If a late afternoon thunderstorm rolled in and cooled the air, Dad would prop the screen door open. If not, the small air conditioning unit in the window would keep us cool.

I walked around the house today enjoying the unearned beauty all around me. The ivy growing in the cedar tree. The day lilies in whites and yellows and oranges. The fruit trees and blackberries and muscadine vines. The Rose of Sharon and gardenia and the magnolia.

All the work of those before me.

Summer will always be lightning bugs blinking, cicadas humming, mosquitoes biting.

Tomato sandwiches, homemade ice cream, vegetable dinners.

Afternoon thunderstorms, long days, hot nights.

God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end. Ecclesiastes 3:11

We have the world to live in on the condition that we will take good care of it. And to take good care of it, we have to know it. And to know it and to be willing to take care of it, we have to love it. Wendell Berry

The beauty that surrounds my home today is the result of my parents’ hard work.

When I was a little girl we had a plain yard. Grass to mow. An apple tree and lots of pine trees in the back. We had a vegetable garden too. But no landscaping. No mulch or fancy stones or yard ornaments. My parents didn’t have the money or time for landscaping until all of us moved out of the house.

Then that’s where they spent most of their time and a lot of their money. A new yard project was underway constantly. Dad was the do-it-yourself master at anything and the yard was no exception. They planted flowers and trees and mulched and sprayed and laid sod and added stepping stones and edgers. They were proud of their yard but mostly enjoyed sharing it with others.

A Fourth of July barbecue, an Easter egg hunt, Mother’s Day and Father’s Day, and Labor Day too. Anytime was a good time to get together and sit in the yard.

My daughter told me last week, “I love how Grandpa planted so many flowers.”

Me too.

We get to experience the bounty of their hard work in the dirt. Their groundwork makes the beauty possible.

Not only in the yard around the house. But in my heart and my memories. In my personality and my character. In who I am.

They did the hard work of teaching us, correcting us and showing us and loving us. They laid the foundation. And it wasn’t easy. And they didn’t do it well sometimes.

They were fighting some tough battles while trying to raise a family. Some we know about. Others we never will. Hardships and addictions and anger and fighting and lying and job losses and lots of bad things happened.

But good things did too. Really good things. Like working together in the yard. Christmases. Playing cards at the dining room table. Sitting on the porch watching thunderstorms.

And apologies and forgiveness and perseverance and love. And all the other good things that come with those.

All of it is groundwork. The good they did, the mistakes they made, the life they lived in front of us.

And we get to experience the bounty of their hard work in the dirt. Their groundwork makes the beauty possible.