A reflection on scarcity, gratitude, and living within limits.
Usually, all our water troughs are kept full — shared with frogs, deer, and whatever else wanders through. On good days, the farm feels like an oasis: water brimming, life gathering, everything drinking deeply.
But in the dry stretches, the story changes. We fill only what’s necessary. The rest stands empty, waiting.
Saturday’s sprinkle was a promise, not a storm. The earth is still thirsty. Dust lifts in the air. Grass crunches underfoot. Yet, even here, the daisy turns its face to the sun. The poppy still holds droplets like jewels — not enough to soak the soil, but enough to shimmer for a moment.
Water is one of those things we cannot manufacture, no matter how hard we work. Rain comes when it comes. All we can do is store it in times of plenty, preserve it with care, and share it wisely when it runs thin.
And it makes me wonder: why are we so poor at preservation? In good seasons, we feast as though the plenty will last forever. We waste. We forget to give thanks. We rarely ration wisely when abundance surrounds us. And then, when the drought comes, fear rises. Suddenly we feel the pinch of what we might have stewarded differently.
Maybe that is the quiet truth of wealth.
Wealth is not about more.
It is about gratitude and preservation.
It is about tending what we are given,
and learning to live within the limits
of what is not in our control.
Because some things — like rain — will always come on their own time.