changes: moving continents, moving house, starting school
also: Sir David Attenborough, wishes come true, and the Man from Snowy River
Welcome back, readers, and welcome, new readers.
Changes to our lives come in many forms; as a poet has written: “Change: that’s just the way it is / Things will never be the same.” Some changes we initiate and welcome: we feel like we’re moving forward in a direction we have chosen. But most changes are not in our control. Some are inevitable results of the passage of time: children grow up, old people get older. Some are forced on us by circumstance: a difficult diagnosis for ourselves or a loved one, a lost opportunity. Some are the result of our own mistakes. Sometimes fortune seems to smile: a bad situation resolves! we fall in love!
Whatever changes come our way, we would do well to remember this advice from CS Lewis: “The great thing, if one can, is to stop regarding all the unpleasant things as interruptions of one’s ‘own,’ or ‘real’ life. The truth is of course that what one calls the interruptions are precisely one’s real life – the life God is sending one day by day.”
Below we write about some changes we’re experiencing in real life: Norann and Trudi find new homes, Marianne finds herself with a high school age child.
Norann – in Danthonia, New South Wales, Australia
In 2013, Chris and I were asked to consider moving our family (the three sons were then in elementary school) into a 1960s farm cottage at Shanta Clare, a homestead that is part of the property the Danthonia community is on, but sits about a mile from the other buildings. (One of the many gifts of living in intentional church community – where we share things like property – is that our homes are provided; families are assigned apartments based on their family needs.) Built alongside the main Shanta Clare residence, which comfortably holds two families, the cottage is a tiny two-bedroom, one-bath affair, with virtually no insulation, an undulating wooden floor, a petite porch, and a kitchenette that opens onto a modest living room.
We agreed to yet another Australian adventure and moved in the next day, as six inches of heavenly rain blessed our cardboard moving boxes piled on the back of a ute (pickup truck).
Now, almost ten years later, we are nearly empty nesters, and another family with small children needs that same cottage.
It is time for a change.
So, a couple weeks ago, we moved from this…
…to this:
On a mild mid-winter’s day, we piled plastic moving boxes onto the ute and moved to our new house. Our time in a rough-and-ready timber and fibro cottage – a wonderful, out-of-the-way place to raise our rough-and-ready sons – was over. It was time to move to a gentler space.
Each Bruderhof community features many different kinds of homes. In some cases, residences predate our community and have been repurposed by us. Some are old (or ancient), showing signs of being “well loved” across generations; others have been designed with great care by Bruderhof architects and builders and are newly (or recently) constructed. Some hold a family or two, others contain several family apartments. (Our new house, for example, has apartments for four families, two of which are custom built to accommodate assisted living.) What matters more than their features is that these are a gift that belongs to the whole and can be used as they’re needed for different family seasons.
I believe that seasonal changes are a chance for reflection, but not regret. Life changes require a look back, but only to treasure what we had as we move forward.
The cottage at Shanta Clare holds many such treasures: birthdays, anniversaries, hunting and hiking excursions; many cats (including the mighty Hobbes who killed countless brown snakes and one fox, and died when he was almost 13 and our sons were grown) and our first dog; news of cancer and births and deaths and weddings; welcomes, farewells; and the campfire out the back, which has heard years of conversations and confidences, tears and laughter, heartbreak and hope.
We’ve cooked and danced and hugged in that kitchen, the son-hugs moving from my chin on their heads to my chin on their chests.
We’ve played endless card games on the old table and hundreds of cricket games in the backyard tennis court.
Plans have been hatched and scotched, arguments begun and resolved, the same stories read and re-told. Old songs have been sung and new ones written, scripture studied, and prayers given.
But most of all its been a place of spontaneous hospitality, a place where people could call in and call it home.
Before driving our last load of pet bowls and plant-filled work-boots down to our new house, I carried a paddock bouquet my son had picked for my birthday and placed it on Hobbes’s grave under the gum tree. I walked back to the living room and thanked God for the gift of this particular house, the sons we raised in it, the friends who visited it, the “grandparents” who loved it (you know who you are!), and for all the memories – both difficult and cherished – we had made there. I asked a mighty blessing on the new occupants – that they would claim it as a place of peace and security for their marriage and their children, and that it would bless them as it had blessed us.
We left a small, noisy, drafty, seen-better-days place filled with growing-up stories and moved into a quiet, tiled, spacious, climate-controlled, and multi-family dwelling – a new place where we will recreate the same things that made our cottage so beloved: conversation and campfires and community, laughter and love, frequent drop-ins, and time with each other.
This is what remains through all seasons and regardless of circumstance: the love in a house, not its location, is what makes it a home.
Trudi – in Yeongwol, South Korea
This week I was on the phone with my sister as she sat in an airport in Sydney, Australia. It was such a delightful feeling of closeness to have a family member at almost the same distance from the prime meridian. (Actual vertical distance doesn’t matter if your clocks are almost the same). After almost eight years in England, she had said goodbye to her friends (many, of all ages) and students (she’s a dearly loved elementary school teacher), and set out for a new home—the same beautiful community that Norann writes from. New students in Danthonia’s elementary school were eagerly awaiting her. A whole new world awaited her.
My sister’s season of change gives me courage for mine. In just one week, I too will be moving continents, back to an old home in Pennsylvania. I wanted to share, but where to even start? What to write? I made several attempts.
Then I did what I always do when I’m thinking: I went to the river.
I’ve come to accept the river as a symbol of life: it keeps moving. Last summer as the helpful analogy dawned on me, I penned a free verse poem. In the meantime, a lot of water has gone under the bridge (yes, literally and figuratively) and the river has become more than a chilly symbol of change: it’s a lovely place to wade and float and think. (Others fish, but not I.)
Yeongwol community, like the Pyeongchang River flowing by, is ever-changing. People come and go, and welcomes and farewells seem as frequent as Mondays. Some visitors come for a few hours, some for a weekend, and others for a month. Then there are folks from abroad who get a three-month visa and just when we feel we’ve gotten to know them, it’s time to cook a farewell meal, wish them well, and say goodbye.
So now it’s my turn to wave from the car window. I’ve been in Korea almost two years in total and I had imagined staying longer. Then I got confirmation that my visa could not be renewed. It was not the news I had wanted to hear but with a bit of time, like a river going through a tunnel, I came out the other side, not with understanding, but at least with acceptance.
You see, I’m no tourist. I’ve lived here long enough that it’s home. Sure, other people look at me and see a tall, red-haired American in Korea. But I avoid mirrors and enjoy life—even if I’m linguistically and culturally clumsy. Of course, I’ve had tough times—every riverbed has rocks to slip on.
As I pack my bags and anticipate life after Korea, I’m strangely uninterested in last-minute souvenir shopping. I have a few things already: a small flag, chopsticks, a dress, and two soju cups. But I didn’t buy any of it and I wouldn’t really mind if my luggage got lost. Even the couple thousand pictures in my google photos drive seem limited in value.
That which is most precious is in my heart: people.
First they were all strangers like I was to them, but then we were friends. Some I only met once but even just a short encounter with sincere conversation enriched both our lives. Others are those who invited me into their lives, into their homes. We worked, ate, talked, sang, prayed, laughed, cried, argued, forgave, learned, and played together. We grew to love each other.
There are children who only in the last year finally became beloved little friends and students of mine. Language barriers are easily underestimated—friendships take time and tireless love, but the bond formed is valued much more deeply. Luckily, there’s no weight limit for memories—they’re all coming with me.
It’s never easy to pull up roots and start life over again. It might seem safer to buy a return ticket or plan the next step in life so as not to let your heart feel the pain of it too deeply.
As I cook and enjoy my last few meals, it’s not only the onions that bring tears to my eyes. At the same time, though, I can live with new joy because the people I’m with and the time I have has suddenly become more precious. So I do not regret living wholeheartedly and allowing Korea to become home. Now I’m thinking about the kindergarten class awaiting me in Pennsylvania and the new people whom I will love. I’ve learned from my river, I’m moving on.
Marianne – in Woodcrest, upstate New York
The change I’m experiencing falls in the category of: children get older. Our oldest son will be starting high school in September.
When he was newborn and I couldn’t bear to let him out of my sight, one of my friends whose children were a little older told me, “It’s ok, you won’t always feel like this. They grow away from you.” And it is ok. He doesn’t need me in the same way he did fourteen years ago, or even four years ago. As he gets older, he’ll need me even less. It’s ok. I guess.
For the last eight years, he’s gone to Woodcrest School, the elementary school on our community which is a two minute walk from our home. A dozen or so students come from the wider neighborhood, and the other sixty are children of people who are part of the Woodcrest community. I went to the same school. His teachers are all Bruderhof members who live here at Woodcrest, so our ideas as parents and theirs as teachers about what is important for children are very closely aligned: work hard, play hard, and try to grow into a good person. Academics are complemented by an incredible range of activities (for instance, a trademark of the 8th grade year is the “Twenty-Four Hours” in which students spend a day in solitude in nature, this is part of the history curriculum and intended to allow them to experience life as primitive man). It’s been fantastic.
In September he will start attending the Mount Academy, a four-year high school operated by the Bruderhof. It’s a twenty minute drive from Woodcrest on the banks of the mighty Hudson River in a gigantic pile built over a century ago by the Redemptorist Brothers as a seminary.
It is also a fantastic school, you can read about some of the highlights on its website. One aspect I really like is that in addition to music, sports, and academic clubs as extracurriculars, there is a strong commitment to making it possible for students to learn trades to a high standard: construction, welding, regenerative agriculture, culinary arts and hospitality.
I did not go to this school. Instead, I and other high school students from the Bruderhof attended public high school. This was in part so that we could meet our peers who had not grown up on the community and learn more about the wider world. I did not love all aspects of it (this being high school), but looking back it was overall an excellent experience. I did make many friends whose families and backgrounds were different than mine, and I learned from teachers whose ideas and viewpoints were quite different from my parents’.
With the rise of personal technology about fifteen years ago, it unfortunately started to be much harder for Bruderhof students (who do not have cell phones) to make meaningful friendships or participate in student life in public high school. Bruderhof parents also became uncomfortable with curricular changes and the creep of critical theory into many academic areas. After much prayer and deliberation, we decided as a church to start our own high school which could offer Bruderhof and other students a thorough education grounded in Christian values. That is the school my son will attend.
Like his classmates, he will not have a cell phone. He will have opportunities to meet students who have not grown up in our communities and learn from teachers of other faiths and backgrounds. He’ll continue to grow and change. It’s good.
What we’re enjoying
Norann
Our youngest son, Derek, struggled with reading until 8th grade, so we augmented much of his primary school science studies with David Attenborough videos. Back in 2016, when David was 90 and Derek was 9, our son handwrote a letter to David to thank him for his informative videos and let him know about the the regenerative agriculture efforts on our property.
Derek was delighted when, a few weeks later, a hand-written, hand-addressed arrived from Sir David Attenborough himself! It included and individualized response along with appreciation for our efforts to care for and regenerate the land. Ever since then, my admiration and appreciation for Sir David has only increased, and now, besides watching everything he creates, I read everything he writes. Most recently, his Journeys to the Other Side of the World has proved a delight as it chronicles some of his travels through the Northern Territory in Australia, particularly places near to where our oldest son worked and lived last year. The prose is captivating and the photography stunning, and it accurately captures a culture and ethos that still (in some ways) exists.
Marianne
Our five-year-old daughter listens to audio books most evenings, usually the same book every night for a month or so. Right now we’re on week three of Edith Nesbitt’s Five Children and It, brilliantly narrated by Virginia Leishman. This is the story of five children who discover a Psammead (or Sand Fairy, “It”), an ancient magical creature with the power to grant a wish every day. They wish for the type of things a lot of people would wish for: to be beautiful as the day. to have endless wealth. to be able to fly. to be knights and live in a castle and fight off marauders. All their wishes come disastrously, hilariously true, real “find your heart’s desire and find despair” stuff. Their first wish results in them becoming so beautiful that no one can recognize them, and they aren’t allowed back in the house for supper. (The wishes wear off at the end of the day.) Without moralizing at all, the story has a pretty blatant moral, and it’s also entertaining enough that I’m still enjoying listening to it every evening.
Grown-up people find it very difficult to believe really wonderful things, unless they have what they call proof. But children will believe almost anything, and grown-ups know this. That is why they tell you that the earth is round like an orange, when you can see perfectly well that it is flat and lumpy.
Trudi
Last week I was playing a game of Hearts. For some reason, I’m always a beginner, never the winner. The four of us—you know who you are—had played many games: first in Taebaek, then in Yeongwol. Of course, knowing it might be our last game, we played our favorite go-to soundtrack: The Man from Snowy River. It’s a must-listen.
When I hear this track, I will smile to remember all the games I lost and the wonderful memories I gained. Music, laughter, people—my Korean home will come with me everywhere.
Find music, let it create good moments that will live on as good memories.
I treasure being able to read of lives lived in faith and love, with a bit of whimsy and magic added for seasoning! My time knowing of The Bruderhof communities is quite short and mostly revealed by what o read of Norann’s posts or Marianne’s in New York. The sense of community is so palpable, and so unlike most of the fast paced money hustles that contaminate living situations world wide. Understanding the meaning of The Plough provides such important context for me as I learn of The Bruderhof.
All the best to those who are moving to new homes - whether across the fields or from one continent to another, and also to a new high schooler beginning a new experience. I live between Woodcrest and the Mount and always send a blessing as I pass by.
Thank you for your beautiful thoughts about change, which is life.
Blessings to all - Susan