Season 3 Trailer: Ordinary Moments on the Fiber Farm

I don’t want to forget this. I don’t want to live on autopilot. That would be such a waste of all the work we put into drastically changing our lives. It would just dismiss  the intention we set at the start—to live with nature and the seasons and to connect deeply with the animals we raise for their fiber.

But there are days when I wonder what I’m doing with my life.  I wonder if I’m doing anything that actually matters.  That could really make any difference in our future.  Those times I feel small and ineffectual. 

And then, there’s a moment like right now.  I’m looking over at Claude, our youngest guanaco.  He’s nuzzling up to his mom, Georgia.  He has his tail up in an apostrophe shape which punctuates the greeting. I swear I will never be able look at an apostrophe without thinking of a guanaco tail. Georgia turns toward her baby. She’s so solid in her nurturing.   And then she curves her long neck to smell his chest.  He leans into her motherly gesture. It’s so sweet and perfectly conveys caring and ownership.  

And with that moment all the questions about whether my actions have meaning float away.   A mother and a child have done their enchanting dance and I’ve witnessed it.  And this becomes part of my life and it’s a part of theirs, and now a part of yours for listening.

*******

“So you remember how we were talking about, we could buy a house somewhere on the water and watch the sunset every day?”, asked Lisa.

“I remember that conversation,” Greg said. 

“What do you remember about it?” Lisa asked.

“That we could buy a house and have a nice water view. And fewer animals, if any, and just kind of hang out inside and watch the sun go down over the water and the storms rolling over the water every day. And we both agreed that that would get old kind of fast. Right?” Greg said. 

“Like, it sounds really attractive? And then when you really think about it, it’s sort of like and then what would we do?”Lisa asked. 

“What’s the learning, the challenge, the growth?” Greg said. 

“Right, like what’s the meaning?” Lisa said. 

“Yeah,” Greg said. 

*******

Maybe the question, “What’s next?”  doesn’t need to be answered by moving or with a new big adventure or project.  What if the answer to “what’s next” could be a response to those Harvard researchers?   What if we decided to stop underestimating the value of the present in our own lives and started figuring out how to capture and learn from those ordinary moments that one day the study says we will likely long for? 

“So  I’ve been thinking about, what if we made stories about the littler things?” Lisa said. 

“Like dogs on walk?” Greg said. 

“Yeah,” Lisa said.  

“Big Leaf maple leaves falling all over the place in the wind,” Greg said. 

“Yeah,” Lisa said. 

“And, you know, I think, a collection of the little things and like, really sharing those, recording them, treasuring them. Not underestimating their importance ends up being really valuable,  life affirming,” Lisa continues. 

I think it’s just sort of a celebration of how ephemeral life is, how temporary it is. And that it’s here and gone in a blink. And that we can live it by, I don’t want to sound too schmaltzy here, we can live it by fearing that, or we can live it by reveling in the fact that it’s all those magic moments that happen daily, that make life magic that make it worth what it is as temporary as it is.

“That’s very beautifully said. Very poetic,” Lisa said. 

So, for this third season of A Fiber Life we’ve decided to forage our lives for ordinary moments and create an auditory scrapbook of sorts. Now, we are by no means experts at this endeavor.   It’s going to take trying some new things, changing some old habits, and navigating more than a few obstacles, I’m certain of that.  But, in the end, I think it is a worthy thing to work on.  

So on the podcast we will share our exploration.  What it means to cherish everyday moments.  How to look at them. How to capture them. And what we can learn about life and living from these moments. 

If this resonates with you, I hope you join us in our exploration and find some peace and respite by listening to the sounds and stories about our little fiber farm on an island in the pacific northwest. 

If you haven’t caught up with our other 2 seasons, now is a great time. We can’t wait to share Season 3: Ordinary Moments on the Farm with you.