Today was a day to describe just to give an idea of the preciousness of life here on the mountain. It was a blue sky, warm weather day. I have decided to put in a bigger garden this year than I have ever done – I’ve usually only had kitchen-type gardens with some herbs and tomatoes and a few scattered flowers. Every year I thought I would finally take the plunge and put in a big one like my mountain friends do, and every year some huge trip has come up in the summer or something like that prevent it. So this is my year.

Mountain friends are like no other friends I have ever known. I woke up this morning to the sound of my neighbor outside running a tiller across the area we had discussed for the garden. He just decided to do it for me. Later in the day I went down to borrow a tool to help me clear a different area that’s covered with juniper, very hard to remove. Their three-year-old wanted to show me the new kittens that were born two days ago. When I was coming back up to do my work, she wanted to come. So she did, and her Mom did and we all worked together and cleared that area for new planting. Hannah, the three-year old, has her own garden gloves and rake, which she brought and utilized. Then her Papaw came up with the tiller again and turned the soil over some more. Then we drank some beers and ate wild onions out of the yard. Then we went down to see the kittens again and one had died because it was too far under her Mama’s body and suffocated. The Mama is less than a year old, too young and inexperienced they explained. Hannah got the saddest look on her face and kept holding the dead kitty. Her Mama didn’t want to bury it because she cries too hard every time she buries an animal. Hannah then brought me some eggs that she found, since their chickens lay them here and there around their property, kind of willy-nilly. A real live Easter egg hunt.

It’s just a spring day on the mountain and I feel so blessed by it. Life is good.