December 7, 2008 – All of life is change, the Buddhists claim. Connie wrote me from Maine last night that humans hold on to dear life for nothing to change, but it does change, and constantly, whether we want it to or not. As we grow up, she writes, some of us finally listen to the small voices, the real ones, inside of our heads and hearts.
  On a farm, change is continuous, relentless, and it can be inspiring and instructive, or the instrument of fear and confusion. Sometimes it’s all of those things. Loving change for its own sake is thoughtless, I think, but fearing all change is useless. I always like Hannah Arendt’s idea: listen to everyone, but mostly, to yourself.
  I was reading E.B. White again this afternoon and his writing about the notion that some Americans were moving to the country to escape the pressures of city life. They must be kidding, White wrote, There is no pressure like that of country living.
  I know what he means. Somethings are wonderful – the warmth of people, the beauty. Some things are not: icy, lonely roads, driving 30 miles for food or groceries, scrambling for hay and people to fix things.
  Moving to the farm is a miraculous gift for me. Working with Rose and the sheep. Izzy and hospice. Cuddling up with Lenore. Learning to love donkeys and steers and roosters. It is a gift that one way or another, keeps on giving, and shaping my life and my work.
  But Connie is right. Each day I wake up expecting to learn what has changed from the day before. There is not a day that I have not found something.