What a long, strange 6 month trip it’s been.
Oh friends… I have missed documenting life at our Dirt Road Farm.
But as our renovations are still on hold, there are not too many renovation-based updates to be had.
In the meantime, you see, I have been just a little overwhelmed, trying to combat Industrial Wind Turbines. (THAT is a story I will update you on… another day soon.)
As I am trying to keep my head above water, oddly enough, I find myself relating to the rodents in the yard.
Our Chipmunks
Chipper and his crew are busy little critters. They run into my perennial garden, fill their cheeks with the black-oil sunflower seeds that the birds have scattered from the feeder, and run out as fast as they can to safety — with their looted cheeks ready to burst.
It’s like stumbling into a gold mine — like winning the lottery. Or finding hundreds of crisp bills blowing down the highway after the Brinks truck has overturned.
They must feel like they have hit pay dirt.
In their excitement and joy, however, they make a few tactic errors, like forgetting where they hid their winnings.
So all around the farm you can find various stages of their spoils of war: sunflower seed bunkers. They sprout up in the most unexpected spots.
Places they thought to bury their stash and planned to return to when the coast was clear.
Only, since they are rodents, they forget where they buried their loot.
A week or so later, if the climate is right, their good intentions grow roots and become vegetation.
Their efforts are for naught and the mounds of baby sunflowers exemplify the best of good intentions. “A” for effort.
I am really relating to Chipper and his sunflower bunkers.
I have such good intentions. Yet I have dug more than a few sunflower bunkers of my own.
To my family and friends… I am so very sorry. I’m sorry for not being present these last few months. Please bear with me — we are almost there.
I miss you all so much that it hurts. I have got to see this through. So I trudge on, trying to persevere.
Running on Fumes.
I know that every time you say “yes” to one thing, you are saying “no” to another.
Trying to combat a Fortune 500 company — in addition to my regular ol’ life responsibilities — takes its toll. Sometimes.
I try to turn off the battle, but my mind is usually whirling with what needs to be done next. Everything BJR and I have planned, saved, and worked hard for, is at risk with DTE wanting to place turbines within 1,000 feet of my dwelling. So I wholeheartedly believe that this is worth every ounce of the fight. Every. Single. Ounce.
I am at the forefront of our grassroots efforts. I have been blessed to meet the most amazing people in this process. Neighbors who were once strangers, who will now be forever friends, who we will celebrate with — until the cows come home! — when we send DTE back to Detroit. Because we will send DTE out of Branch County. This little ol’ wind industry is truly at a pivotal point in the state of Michigan — Consumers Energy reported to the Michigan Public Service Commission in June of this year that wind built in Michigan may not be cost-effective or a feasible option.
Please go back and read that again: one of our two major utility companies, in this state, said that because of opposition to wind farm developments and poor wind speeds in counties west of the Thumb, that wind built in Michigan may not be cost-effective or feasible.
Yet DTE is trying to cram a size 5 shoe on my size 8 1/2 foot, while having the nerve to tell me that I am gonna love the way it fits.
Nah. It doesn’t fit. Thanks but no thanks — we don’t want the size 5.
Plan B
BJR and I had a heart to heart, a come to Jesus moment, a month or so ago…the conversation went something like this:
Plan A — defeat DTE and not live next to an Industrial park.
What is Plan B, BJR wanted to know?
Plan B — try harder.
If you are one of my people, you know I am like a dog with a bone (which is not always a good thing).
If you are one of my people, you know my intentions are ever so good.
Only you know what they say about intentions. Yikes. Ouch.
So I am sorry.
Hence my asking for your forgiveness now.
Thanks for sticking by us here at Dirt Road Farm as we continue to combat improperly sited Industrial Wind. Thanks for giving me grace even when I am scattered, stretched thin, and certainly not my best self. I would be lost without grace! I need it in the most fundamental way.
Someday really soon, this will be over…and I am gonna try my hardest to make it up to you…
Thank you for always being with me,
even when I get distracted and lose my way.
Continue to bless our Dirt Road Farm.
Bless all my family, Lord.
Love on them, protect them, and grow them closer to you.
Help me learn to run with endurance the race you have set before me
and to never forget my strength is from you.
Help me keep my eyes on You, Lord.
Amen.
(P.S. And thank you very much, God, in advance, for the victory that is coming. Amen.)
XOXO from me to you…
PJR