Two smells, both sweet and spicy, mingle together in the spring sunshine: these smells are burned into my memory, sweet, spicy, happy, and sad, all in one big mass of tangled weeds and livestock poop. If you know, you know.
It isn't spring here right now, not even close. And I neither smell nor see cow manure. There are no buttercups bobbing their brilliant, waxy heads at the base of the gate panels in the barnlot, because it's February. But there is a barnlot in my head, and let me tell you, it's full of crap and weeds for days. Mud, rocks, nettles, buttercups, and ruts: memories of broken things, narrow knowledge, fractured perspectives, untrustworthy instincts,and ingrained defenses.
This is just a heads up. Know where you're walking as you spend time in my thoughts and life. Even the pretty yellow flowers can be toxic.
So, why even read this stuff? Because, if you're anything like me, you've come to realize that the barnlot is one of the places you go to again and again. On happy days and sad days. When things make sense, and when things don't. When you wish you knew more, and when you wish you could erase memories. And there, amidst the manure, buttercups, and ruts, the sky looks down on you and smiles or weeps. Sometimes the golden warmth of a smiling sun makes the buttercup blooms pop with brightness, and creation laughs with you. Other times billows of dark clouds hang and build above the treeline while chill wind whips hay grass in swirls and wraps around you in understanding.
There is a Son of Man. He saw me there: torn jeans (not stylish, just torn. because they were old), frizzy hair, broken spirit, messy mind, lonely heart. He came, He sat, He listened, and He comforted me. I tangled many of His words in my mind and heart. The words he meant for my good were often twisted to harm me, by myself and by others. But I have found over the years as I sit with him in this place, that He is still there, and that He is still kind, and that He is an excellent biology teacher. All that organic matter that only ever seemed to produce stink and mess, is teeming with life and significance. The chaos actually does have order and meaning, and there is hope.
There is a mountain of organic matter in our souls, y'all. Cow poop and buttercups, they both have a place and a purpose.
This is beautiful.