Lord, Take Me Home in the Springtime
I hated burying my mom on the coldest day of the year. It was late January and while the sky was blue, there was a bitter wind blowing on that hilltop. My Aunt Rosie and I were the only ones at the cemetery. It was just too cold for any kind of formal gathering. I could not let them put her in the ground alone though. So, I stood with a borrowed coat wrapped tight beneath my chin, shivering in the thin, January light.
In contrast, Mr. Virgo died in the middle of March, which is a lot different in Colorado than it is here in West Virginia. Still, the day we laid him to rest, the sun was shining and it was warm enough for a light jacket. It’s funny the way your brain works when your beloved dies. I distinctly remember thinking if he had to die, at least he died in the spring when the earth was coming back to life. I didn’t have to lay him in the frozen ground. And I didn’t have to go into my grief and compound it with seasonal affective disorder. These are the things I think about while I’m driving.
A couple of nights ago, I slept out back in TOW-Wanda. While it was wonderful to be in the camper, it stormed all night long and the only thing I could think of was that huge, old cherry tree just outside the camper. Just like the message about the rockslide a couple weeks ago, I kept getting this feeling like I had to get TOW-Wanda out of there. I need to get this tree taken out before it falls on anything…or anyone…and they can’t get any equipment back up in there with my camper parked in the driveway. I have friends who have offered to let me park TOW-Wanda at their place, but I don’t want to impose, or ruin their grass, or disturb them with coming and going as I want to camp this spring and early summer. I found a place where I can store her securely and anytime I want to take her out to camp, they’ll pull her out for me and all I have to do is hook her up and go. Then, I drop her off, and they take her around back to park her. All for $35 a month. Perfect!
I decided I needed to get this done yesterday as we are supposed to get severe storms the next few days and I’m running out of time before I leave for the beach. Getting this huge trailer in and out of this long, narrow driveway is tricky. One of the biggest obstacles is the electric lines going up to the top of the cellar house. They hang low over the driveway. In the past, I’ve had someone hold them up with a broom while I backed under them. I didn’t have any helper yesterday and being the EVER resourceful woman that I am, I had to figure out how to do it myself. I took a long 1x2 that I found in the cellar, taped a walking stick to it, then taped the broom handle to that and…voila! It worked like a charm! The electric line nestled in the bristles of the broom and stayed right where I put it.
Now, backing up out of the driveway was interesting. I got down to the road but I was worried about hitting the pole on the other side of the driveway. It’s a pretty busy road for being so far out in the country and the only thing I could do was slowly back out onto the blacktop. I was almost all the way out when a guy in a pickup stopped and guided me those last few feet. Easy peasy! The new truck towed fine…just doesn’t have the torque like the old one had, which I expected.
I needed to get back to mow. As I drove through the hills, I rolled down the windows and the smell of the honeysuckle, lilac, dogwood, redbud, apple, peach, apricot, pear, and crabapple trees was so incredibly sweet. It was then that I sent up my plea to God. “When it is my time to go, please take me in the springtime so my last day will be filled with beauty such as this perfect West Virginia day.” That is all I ask. ❤️
“yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that."” James 4:14-15 ESV