About

At the end of County Line Drive, the smell of garden dirt lingered in the house. The crack of a wood-splitting maul could be heard beyond the pickup truck in the back yard. The truck had its bed stashed with random garden tools. The broken handles and worn blades signified the work that had been finished, yet their presence in the vehicle meant they were still at the ready and there was work to be done.

It was a simple Wisconsin life; the landscape of my childhood.

The garden was located about ¼ mile from our house in a leftover field corner that was too difficult for the neighbors conventional farm equipment to access. Surely, some of my clearest memories from childhood were from that overlooked place; -some of them sweet and some that would fit into the “character-building” category. Just a handful of these include the sweltering July sun, the smell of the weeds (sneezefest), the bites of the deer flies, the call of the indigo bunting, and the taste of a fresh, extremely gritty carrot. I’ve heard that one remembers things more clearly if all of the senses are involved in an experience. My recollections of our garden prove that point.

For sure, the memories of the people and the life of my childhood go much deeper than the smells, sights, and sounds from the garden. So deep, that they’re difficult to express in words or pictures. I’ve made attempts to somehow recreate these experiences and feelings of my youth and carry them with me today. Together with my wife and daughters, I’ve planted a 2′ x 11′ garden in the backyard that seemed almost too small to be useful. I’ve gone back to the original garden, only to find weeds over my head and a few scraggly raspberry bushes left. These attempts at connecting the past with the present and future helped, if only for a while.

Then, in May of 2010, I heard a call from God to truly live within his purposes and share it in the best way that I knew how, -through music. Since then, I have found that writing songs and playing them for people comes as close to getting at the heart of what is inside of me as anything else. Crafting songs has given me a chance to explore the connectedness of life’s moments. Writing has helped me process how the “gardens” of my youth represent the “gardens” of our lives today and those in the future. So many metaphors exist there that it’s scary. The themes and cycles of preparation, cultivation, nourishment, growth, disease, hardship, perseverance, harvest, dormancy, hope, and renewal are just some of these themes that follow us everyday.

I’m so privileged to be able to glorify God through music. I’m hoping, with His direction, this is just the beginning of my journey into exploring life through song. Thinking back, I’ve found the truck bed full of tools is a fitting metaphor for the work that is to be done.