Undercurrent

I can't get away from it these days. Not that I want to, but every step I take seems to lead me deeper, whether I mean it to or not.


I received a comment on a post a while back from the founder of Johnny Seeds, and in a quick email exchange, he offhandedly mentioned the author Louis Bromfield. I couldn't figure out if I had heard of him before, but am always up for good recommendations, so requested Pleasant Valley from the library. I didn't realize it was an autobiography. I have only read the first 50 pages, but have this insatiable desire to carry the book around and read passages from it to anyone who will listen.


I know that there aren't many people that really understand what it is that is stirring my heart these days, but, like I said, it keeps pulling me in, so I am compelled to keep talking about it, even if no one really gets it.


Louis Bromfield grew up in rural Ohio near his grandfather's farm. He wanted to become a farmer, but was encouraged by his mother to travel the world first. He became a writer, and spent 30 years in other parts of the world, most of that time in Europe. After thirty years, at the onset of WWII, he moved back to Ohio and bought a farm.

He believed that farming practices in America had largely destroyed the soil. He described it as raping and mining. Soil life, minerals, and nutrients were being taken from the soil and nothing was given back to it. Bromfield wanted to prove that 'worn out farms could be restored again...' He wanted to be a new pioneer 'who created new forests and healed and restored the richness of the country God had given us, that richness which, from the moment the first settler landed on the Atlantic coast we had done our best to destroy.'

Restoration. I'm hearing it over and over. Back in the fall, I went to a women's retreat. I don't remember a thing about the retreat. I just remember that when we were supposed to 'seeking the Lord,' the only thing I could think about was the healing and restoration of the soil, of the earth. And recently, I have started to see the coupling of this passion for the restoration of the earth with the restoration of people as well. Something I can't explain, but something I know is there.

On a slightly different note, I have also been thinking about the disconnect between the majority of 'conservative Christians' and creation. It feels as if most have given up on the earth as a cursed entity, and therefore have the right just to let it all 'go to hell' as it were... but I think I'll get into that some other time. That's a little too deep for me to wade through tonight.