by Jaime Schaffer
Painting: A Farm in the Sunlight, Meindert Hobbema (1668)
AN ODE TO OUR HOME
We have lived behind the veil
in our hamlet of a home,
hidden,
hedged in with pine trees,
planting wisteria
as a monument to God's lavishness,
and slinging osage oranges just for fun.
Every corner is an altar—
praise poured out in the form of feasts;
our love spilled out in the form of babies,
who grew into boys
and who are marching into manhood.
A home full of music and beating drums
that brings forth a rhythm only we understand.
A solid place
with impenetrable peace
that we carefully established
as a refuge;
protecting its boundaries like sentries,
sleeping in the comfort of the space
carved out like a cleft in a rock,
ignorant of the storms that are raging outside—
blissfully unaware that life could ever look any different.
We have lived behind the veil—
secretly growing and thriving.
Incubated.
A greenhouse of love whose walls tell stories,
narrating an epic tale of a boy
who met a girl
and asked her to dance.
Then he prophesied,
"We will be good,"
—never dreaming that the goodness
would call them to greatness;
that they would walk lockstep
toward a future
teeming with dreams of orchards,
heavy with ripened fruits
that hang low over the walls for passers-by to pick freely;
for the vines sprout from one branch,
a living branch,
planted by streams of living water.
We are a planted people.
Rooted.
Entangled in the fiber of our landscape.
Willingly embedded in the topography of Creation.
This home—
fixed in our souls,
imprinted on our minds,
tucked away
to be brought out in times of remembrance—
is a picture window
hung like a piece of art,
whose painted sky is not only full of the brushstrokes of sunset
but illuminated with the light show of thunderstorms.
This sanctuary of a home—
where God meets with us at the kitchen sink,
and we rejoice in the invitation
to remember,
to celebrate,
to pay tribute to
the making of a home.
And then—
to step into the dark hallway,
bound by love,
but not blinded by it;
for love came down and beckoned to us
through the veil,
awakening our hearts to the glory
of dreams we didn’t pursue,
but which have chased us down instead.
JAIME SCHAFFER
Jaime Schaffer is a homeschooling mom who finds herself quickly approaching the end of that season. She writes to remember, to process, and to redeem this one life she has been given. She is the founder of The Wren, a creative collective practicing the art of seeing and hearing. Jaime and her husband of 24 years, Allen, live in NJ with their three sons and two Bernese Mountain Dogs.