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A Labor of Love

When I taught kindergarten, I had to give a standardized test. One question showed a man chopping wood and the same man reading a book. I asked the students to choose which picture showed the man ‘working.’ A boy chose the man reading and filled in the appropriate circle. After the test, I asked him why. He said that his dad was a professor, and to relax he chopped wood.

It was no surprise to me. Years ago my brother, Mike, bought the woods adjacent to our grandparents’ farmhouse. The woodlands next door are home to the Sorrowful Mother Shrine, a frequent destination in our youth, and the repository of many sins and secrets.

Mike’s son is 12. They drive slowly down the stone path in his truck to the rugged pole barn to chop wood. Mike tells stories to his son, Jared, about our adventures in the woods with grandma and grandpa: crossing the creek on a log, identifying wildflowers.

For a moment Jared’s Asberger’s gives way to peace and Mike forgets about buying school buses. The barn is their shrine.

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