When I was a teenager, between the age of 17 and18 I had a memory making, life changing experience, working as a volunteer on a pig farm. How the heck could that be life changing? Well I'll tell you. I learned about myself, what I loved and what I didn't. I found out how much I loved almost everything about the farming lifestyle.
The opportunity to connect with the earth and my environment, helped me to realize how much I loved to get down and dirty in the dirt. I also came to know and understand the importance of discipline that comes from hard physical work outside and how we all need to be good stewards of the earth.
Pigs are smart, sweet and funny. They should be outside with their snouts rootin' out weeds not stuck on cement floors, imprisoned in steeled cells, inside day upon day, never seeing or feeling the warmth of the sun or the earth upon their skin. Never pet a pig on the head when he's in a cell, because when he lovingly looks up at you, your hand will be wedged in between his head, and that steel bar. You might not be able to retrieve your hand again, at least not in one piece, I know this happened to me, but thankfully I was able to get my hand out.
Horses are also very smart, and somewhat unpredictable if you are not an experienced rider, just as are geese ornery, and will chase you if they sense you're intimidated, fearful, or they simply want to chase you. I learned too, if you work on a pig farm don't go to Bible Study. Trust me, you'll smell like a pig no matter how much you scrub up before hand.
Speaking of smelly, I also learned that a shit spreader is the best way to get manure onto a garden. As the operator of this machine, once sung out to me, one very fine dancin' Welshman, "That'll make'er grow!" And it did too!
The Ace of Pentacles reminds me of my strong connection with all the living and growing things of the earth, in all of creation. It's a good feeling that makes me feel whole and I know now, the raw force of nature does nothing in vain.
2 comments:
These memories are so lovely to read.What a wonderful grounding experience. I agree that the natural world has it way to restore our energy and to heal our souls. Maybe that is why we call nature our mother.:)
Working on farm... I've done it once in horrid circumstances:. All the teens of our province had to help harvest the potatoes by hand, in pouring rain, because the land was wet to be worked on with machinery.:(
Thank you so much for saying Ellen <3 It was a really wonderful part of my adolescence and has stayed with me always. We even had barn dances, and outside masses during the blessings of the animals.
Oh that's brutal your dreadful potato labour! There's work and then there's drudgery. I think we know which what that was! Much worse that being on a big pile of hot and rotted pig poo digging it out to make a hot frame for growing vegetables.
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