The Last Harvest

Posted on December 24, 2019 by Laura Lindblom under Photography, Writing

The year is winding down to a close. How did that happen? Where does the time go? Another year, rapidly wrapping itself up. Parts of this post would have been better a month ago, but they are sentiments I wanted to share after my hiatus this fall. It has been a year of change, struggle, blessings, joy, and so much else.

Christmas is tomorrow, and it will be the first Christmas without Grandma. Leading up to Grandma passing away in April, and ever since, there has been the anticipation of impending change. As long as Grandma was with us, we had a home here, but as often happens in situations of family property, the property will need to sell, and our home here will be gone. That’s a fact I try not to dwell on, and the LORD has graciously given me a peace about that, which years ago I never expected. But whether we have another 8 months or 2 years here, the feeling of settledness isn’t there. I know change is on its way.

Through much of this year, there has been the faintly bitter, wistful knowledge of the inevitable “last time.” The sense that the wanderings on the property this summer or fall may indeed have been “the last time” I’d comb for wildflowers or ramble among our trees or scramble our hills. Putting up a Christmas tree in our cabin may have been “the last time” we’d enjoy that tradition here. I anticipate a sweet sorrow tomorrow on Christmas as we celebrate, quite possibly, “our last Christmas here.”

That knowledge is heavy with sadness, though also light with anticipation. God will provide. He always does. And it is always better than I could imagine.

But this heaviness has driven me to remember and to do and to be. There have been things I’ve deliberately done in order to not miss doing them one last time. For instance, when the apple trees down the hill from Mom and Dad’s were heavy with fruit this fall, I knew we needed to harvest them. It doesn’t take overly long to pick two trees worth of fruit, and we shook those apples down, filling a couple of good sized buckets. The apples were delicious, and became apple butter and apple crisp.

Picking apples from Grandpa’s trees likely was our last harvest from those trees. And it was the best harvest of all the years we’ve been here. God is so good.

As 2019 wraps up and comes to a close, I anticipate that this time next year I will have moved on, either elsewhere in the Black Hills or elsewhere altogether. My life here on the family property has been like an apple tree ripe, laden with fruit. The fruit setting on the tree are those memories and experiences that are shaping who I am, those blessings that God has set beautifully among the spreading branches, that have made up the beauty and color and flavor of my life here.There has been fruit that has grown and ripened that is specifically the result of living here, fruit ranging from the sweetness of deepened family relationships to the zesty excitement of a new direction vocationally. Had I been living elsewhere, without the backdrop of the Hills (particularly my little corner of it) to awaken my imagination to new possibilities, to spark ideas and creative pursuits, to challenge me physically, to grow me spiritually, or had I beem living in a place that drained me financially, I might be in a very different place from where I am now.

Life is like an orchard, each tree a different chapter in our lives. It is sad to think that this year here may be the last year to be harvesting from this beautiful little tree I’ve been enjoying for the last five years.But it has been a good harvest. A sweet harvest.

Just a Reminder…

Posted on May 1, 2019 by Laura Lindblom under Photography

Just a reminder that spring IS on its way, for everyone despairing that we’ll ever see warm weather or the sun again.
These pasques were found in the rain on Resurrection Sunday, on the very back part of our property that somehow I’d never hiked to before! Pasques do well in areas that were recently disturbed, such as land that has been burned or logged, and these were true to form.

What a spring we’ve had!

Feathers and Stars

Posted on May 1, 2019 by Laura Lindblom under Photography, Writing

I think we say this every spring, but the weather has been taunting us. We’ve had glorious tastes of springtime, followed by chilly, winterish days, followed by summer weather, then snowstorms. That cycle has repeated itself a few times and, as I type this, the most beautiful snow is falling outside my window, a snowstorm that began at midnight on Sunday. I’m sure we’ve had 8-10″ by this point, in two different cycles of snow, much of which melted off in between, and it is still coming down relentlessly.

In spite of the untimeliness of a snowstorm at this time of year, I can’t help but be awestruck by the beauty of snow, particularly falling snow. Part of me would prefer balmy spring weather and wildflower hunting, but the enchantment of a snowstorm – of trees in the snow, of snow-covered hillsides, of snow falling with a soft sound from heavy-laden branches, of footprints in the snow, of the silence of a snowed-in world – is hard to resist.Enya, in her song “Amid the Falling Snow,” writes, “A million feathers falling down, a million stars that touch the ground.” That song is one of my favorites, and those lines have always stuck with me.

Feathers and stars, and a world transformed. Winter can last a little longer.

Parable in a Pasque Flower

Posted on April 22, 2019 by Laura Lindblom under Photography, Writing

Pasque flowers appear after the bitterness of winter, often before winter has fully wasted itself out in storms and cold and darkness. They are a sign, a beacon of hope. Asleep in the ground for the months of winter’s cold, at the appropriate time they fight their way to life, seemingly delicate and vulnerable. But what strength is seen in the first of spring’s flowers! Tiny things that should be crushed under what remains of winter, they prevail. Against all odds, they spring up here and there, bathing hillsides in the glory of springtime. They are the first glimmer of hope that winter won’t last forever, and that spring will truly come. There is life in the dead ground. There is warmth, and light, and growth.
First there is one, then a couple, then dozens, then they’re everywhere. Spring has come. Winter is defeated.

How appropriate that they bloom at Easter time, hence the name “pasque,” having to do with the time of Passover, the time of deliverance. The “paschal lamb” was the sacrificial lamb of Passover, ultimately fulfilled in Christ, our once-for-all-time Paschal Lamb.

At Easter, we celebrate hope, the hope and certainty that our Salvation, our deliverance, is secure, through the paschal sacrifice of our Lamb of God, to redeem His people from their sins. The hope began with one man, amidst a storm of controversy and opposition, against which a mere man never could have prevailed. But the God-Man could. His ministry turned into a couple, then a dozen, then hundreds, confounding the religious elite of the day who did everything they could to crush His ministry. It seemed as if they’d succeeded, that gruesome day when they nailed Christ to the cross of crucifixion, a horrific instrument of torture. Christ, the God of the Universe, was slaughtered, brutally, willingly, voluntarily, in order to satisfy the Plan of eternity to save, to give hope, to change hearts, to reconcile sinners to God.

“There in the ground His body lay
Light of the world by darkness slain.”
For two dark days, His broken body was dead, buried, but on the morning of the third day, Christ defeated death. Against all human odds or laws of science, Christ broke the chains of death and returned in a glorified human body. Death was defeated.

“Then bursting forth in glorious day
Up from the grave He rose again!”

What began with one man has blossomed into millions, millions of tiny beacons of hope that light the darkness of this world, that give us hope that the darkness won’t last forever, that the winter of our souls can become springtime, that death can give way to life, that goodness can come from decay. No other religion or person or movement has ever rocked world history like Christianity, and no other worldview can boast the lives radically changed for the better, hatreds healed, hearts transformed. In spite of all opposition, Christianity has flourished for over two millennia. And where it is hardest pressed, there it blossoms the most gloriously. Each life changed by Christ is a testament to the truth of the Gospel, the hope that we have to be reconciled to our Heavenly Father, to have our sins forgiven, to have our hearts radically changed. We aren’t doomed to ourselves and our sins forever. There is hope.
Remember that, when you see these first flowers of spring. They are a mini parable of how God works and has worked to bring about Salvation, to defeat death, to bring life and hope and peace and reconciliation.

My Sweet Girls

Posted on April 18, 2019 by Laura Lindblom under country life, Photography

I can’t believe I was allergic to cats growing up. Now, I don’t know what I’d do without them. My two kitties, Ember and Cinders, are sweet, affectionate little things, with such distinct personalities and ways of expressing their sweetness. And given that Ember is something of a grouch with other cats, it is amazing that she has actually grown to really like Cinders, and the two of them play and roughhouse hilariously.

I spent a little while on a nice morning outside watching them play. God’s creatures are so beautiful.

Spring Again

Posted on April 18, 2019 by Laura Lindblom under Photography

Another spring is here – for real, this time. We may get some more snow (likely, actually), but when the pasques are out, spring is really, really here.
I found these on a little trail in Rapid City just before a piano lesson last week. What a lovely find! There are a few other wildflowers I really get excited about, but pasques are particularly special. They mark the end of a long winter, and the beginning of beautiful weather and the promise of more living, blooming things, and of vivid, rambunctious color coming back to the landscape!