Reflective Wanderer

The first memory I have of him was on the day after his birth. Kaelyn, then four years old, took one look at the little baby in Mom’s arms and literally frolicked round the bed in her excitement. As an infant he had some troubles nursing, which grew worse. I can see Dad say gravely that Josh might not make it. I laid on the red living room couch and wondered what it would be like if baby Josh didn’t pull through. But he did. He grew fast, with curly red hair and chunky cheeks. Fast forwarding through the baby stage (in which all of my siblings more or less seem the same to me) to the toddler years, he was the cutest in two year olds, at least two year old boys. I called him “Hunk”, because he was so big and chunky. He was my little buddy then. I even prayed that God would some day give me a boy as adorable as Joshua. We had an indoor swing that my mom had Dad hang from the ceiling for her birthday. I would often swing on it with him on my lap, which he loved and squealed with delight. 

He got a tad older and I inspired him with a love of farming. I had my heart set on being a Joel Salatin type of natural farmer and I shared that passion with him. I took him milking with me, and taught his little chubby hands how to hold the teats and squeeze the milk out. Often when I’d be milking he’d come over and beg to do one side with me, and he got quite good, at least with the “easy goat.” He had tons of questions, none stop questions like only a two to five year old can have. I recall being out one night doing the chores with him tagging along and he asked me “Awex, what would you do if all the chickens started laying so many eggs that they filled up the whole chicken house?” That same night had a large bright white moon and the next question he asked was “Awex, what would you do if the moon was falling out of the sky at us?” I smiled and responded, “Move out of the way”. The reason I remember these two questions so vividly is because afterward I told the story to Emily, and we laughed over it at the time. He must have been into moons then, because during another milking session he asked “How did God hang the moon in the sky? Did he climb up a ladder to put it there?” 

I told him the way to be a good farmer was to put the animals on grass, not cooped up cages like the factories, and made him promise that on his farm he’d be a “good guy farmer.” A couple times a year I’d bring out all my farming books so he could look at the pictures. That dream started to die out in me as I got older and other visions filled my head, so I fanned the flame in him all the more, because one of us needed to take on the holy mantle. One of the last memories I have of just us, is getting down my old dusty Joel Salatin books for him to look through the pictures again. He was always good with the animals. I can see him now, in my old farmer hat he wore all the time–that I’d given him for Christmas, his last Christmas–in the animal pen, taking care of some baby goats, helping them eat, because their mother wouldn’t feed them. He was such a diligent boy when I came to the garden and outdoor work, and he uniquely cared for the little plants and animals. He was a real boy though too. He loved to play, he got in trouble, snuck food, and sometimes didn’t wipe off the table when he was told. At probably around age seven I remember thinking “boy, that Josh is such a stinker”. But he was growing, and I remember when he turned nine, realizing “he’s really growing into a… caring, manly little fellow”.  

Through the two years I was terribly sick I have one thing that really stands out to me. In that time I’d tell him and various other siblings stories and read them books when I could. He’d come up to me, and I knew it was a trick question, he’d say (in his little stuttering way) “how are you fee… fee…feeling Alex?” and if I’d say “a little better” he would ask for a “Fredrick and Thomas story.” He loved my little tales about those two mice, always wanting another. 

He was very talkative and outgoing with people unless he got too much attention, then he’d get shy and bashful. He loved to build; forts and legos and the like. He enjoyed life. Some of his favorite things were split pea soup, stories, farming, and playing toy guns outside with his brothers. He liked riding the three wheeler with Chris, doing bees with Jon, or using Nick’s tools. He spent tons of time in the garden with my dad, and he would always bring Mom the sweetest fruits from the orchard. He loved the little girls, Hanna and Celia, and would hug on them and kiss them till they cried. He cared for people, he really did. He’d talk your ear off if you’d let him. He was sweet and thoughtful in his own little stuttering, Joshy way. 

Some of my last memories are laying on the floor in the boys room playing legos with him and Sam, reading Aesop’s fables on the couch with his blue eyes in wrapped attention, and bringing him as chaperone with Emily and I to an interview, when we discovered he thought his job was to make sure we “didn’t eat any junk food”. My very last memory, the day of the accident, I was in the homeschool room and he came in to ask me if I would take him to the Dollar Store down the road so he could buy some legos to give to a friend at his birthday party. I promised him I would, later. That was the last time I saw him.

“Today would be your tenth birthday, Hunk. I miss you terribly for all you were and all you would have been. I appreciate everything that made you, and I cling to all you left us. I love you to the moon and back.”