I want to thank everyone for all of the advice pouring into my computer about repairing the Old Red Rocker Maria has rescued from the eaves of the old barn. It is a chair with great character, and I hope to sit on it one day and rock my way into old age. I can see sitting on it outside in the shade, or on the porch or in the living room.

I was startled by the volume of advice – you know I have written about advice many times and am evolving away from my knee-jerk wariness of it.

I was told to find a crafts class and learn to weave, given the names of several basket weavers who do chairs, sent a link to a basket seat replacement kit from Amazon, and offered many other solutions to the problem. Like me, many of my readers are impulsive, and in something of a rush.

I appreciate the thought and care, but the advice provoked some thinking and introspection, as it always does, and I think I’m not going to do any of those things.

For one thing, this is Maria’s chair, not mine, she found it, and she will decide what to do with it. She might call a weaver, do it herself, or ponder it for a year or two.

Our society moves quickly and with urgency, we are mightily stressed, but here on my farm, I am learning the lesson of being in no hurry. The basket has been sitting in the barn for 100 years or so and doesn’t need to be repaired immediately. I have absolutely no interest in learning how to basket-weave, I can’t imagine taking a class like that or inflicting myself on the teacher,  or in repairing the chair myself.

I know when I am in over my head, and the work, if it goes anywhere, should go to a profession who knows how to do it. I could never sit still in a writing class, why would I want to hear somebody drone on about  weaving?

That is not me. Know thyself. I don’t like the idea of an Amazon weave kit, to be honest, I just have a hunch it wouldn’t work and would be a mess. Too many changes to screw it up.

I have a lot of things to do in my life – run my farm, take photos, love my wife, blog, write my book, herd a sheep, see my friends. I need a class like a need less hair. And I do not have much spare time to fill.

I think there is this visceral rush in America to deal with things, and social media reinforces this idea of what help and advice is. Don’t get me wrong, I am beginning to appreciate it, it is all about people wanting to do good.

I am often guilty of rushing into things, of doing things right away that can wait. Balancing our checkbook at the end of every month is teaching me to be patient, and think and wait.

The farm and the animals and finances have taught me to take a longer view. My guess is that one day, someone will show up on the farm whose mother, sister or grandmother is a weaver, and repairs chairs for not too much money.

Or Maria will call the weaver she has heard about in Vermont and set things in motion. But honestly, I don’t see the rush. Slowly and painfully, I am learning that most of the things I rush to do can wait. I love the way things work in the country. You don’t go online and order a kit, you don’t take a class.

You wait to run into somebody who knows somebody, and you always do, without fail. In the country, there is always somebody who does that, and has been doing it for years. You find them or they find you. And they get the support of being paid for their skill. If every goes online, there won’t be any of these people.

I am coming to terms with the idea of patience and fate. The chair may never get fixed, or it will get fixed soon, but I have this image in my head that I will be rocking in it before too much time is up. Something to look ahead to.