Are you kids different than your chickens? It’s not a question you will be asked every day. I was asked today, and I’m still thinking about it.

I get some great mail here at the farm this time of year, and from all over the country.

Somehow, many of the messages from the Midwest stand out. They still know how to write letters there, and send them to people rather than wave to them on Facebook. ,

I got a package of mail from  “Melissa (Middleswart) in Missouri” and her Stanberry Farms. I like to close my eyes and picture Stanberry Farms, I think it is a warm and busy and loving place.

Melissa recycles paper, and is a huge supporter of Mother Earth, so her letters to me are written in scraps and small bursts, they are all interesting.  Her letters come in about a dozen pieces, usually thin scraps with hand-written messages.

And every scrap is a gem.

She also usually includes a voluntary payment for the blog, and a donation for the Mansion/Refugee Fund.

I think she loves Christmas.

Her messages were especially vibrant today. The first one grabbed my eye. I can tell she is a farmer.

“Our chickens are so different from our children…When there is snow on the ground they just stay inside and look out the window. But not so for the children, they hurry with their work so they can have fun in the snow.”

I love this idea, my daughter is very different from chickens too.

And she wrote me this wonderful poem:

“When you were a child,

Did you Heart Skip A Beat?

When A Sweet Aroma Signaled A Treat?

There’s Nothing Like Homemade Bread and Cake

Just Like Grandma Used to Make...”

I think I want to go visit Stanberry Farm. I can picture it, a big kitchen with a pot of coffee always hot, visitors always welcome, food always on the table, the family coming in from the barns stomping their feet. Her messages remind me of Ed and Carol Gulley and the Bejosh Farm Journal.

Melissa also wrote this poem on memory-making:

“The time is here when days are short and nights are long

So why not have friends for supper and fill the air with song.

Or visit a shut-in and fill his heart with cheer.

It will make memories – enough to last all year.”

And finally, “The Golden Rule:”

“The Golden Rule,” Oh, that’s the rule for me,

to do to others as I would have, that they should do to me.

Will always make us kind and good, as we would like to be.”

Thanks Melissa, for existing, for reading my blog, for believing in me. You have no idea how much of a gift that is.