I am a southerner. Born, raised and loved by grandparents who were born, raised lived and died in Stanly County, an hour east of Charlotte. Today is my Grandma Whitley's birth date and if she were still alive she would be 109. It's funny how I use her birth year, 1900, as a reference point. When I was reading Scott Huler's book, Defining the Wind, my grandma's birth year gave me a reference point in history that made events more concrete and closer to my own life. When he talked about inventions I would be able to see inventions that occurred only 20 years before my grandma's birth or when she was 2.

My grandparents on both sides of the family were rooted in the earth. The Whitleys were farmworkers and the Poplins mill workers but both liked to farm and garden. Their world was not a world of theory or theology, dogma or dogmatics, but the concrete realities of day in, day out living on this planet with finite materials and events. As I child, I did not always understand their point of view because the world had changed so drastically for them in their lifetimes. All of my grandparents experienced the movement from horse-drawn vehicles to cars and trucks. Raised in an economy and landscape where each human raised the family food, they saw the movement of sustenance from the garden/farm to dependence on grocery stores. By the time I was old enough to value their place in history, they had forgotten most of the changes they had experienced. I would ask, "Grandpa, do you remember when you got your first car?" More often than not at that time his answer was, "I don't rightly recollect."

My Grandma Whitley died when she was 88. Twenty-one years has passed since her death and yet, on her birthday I cannot help but celebrate her life. I miss her still. Of course, that remembrance of her leads my memory and heart to my other grandparents. Grandparents often have the time that parents do not have when raising a family. While my parents worked, I watched Grandma Whitley wash clothes in her old ringer washer. The cool cement was damp in the well-house and she made us step away from the machine to assure we wouldn't stick our hands in the ringer. It was an exciting time. Standing in the morning light you could feel not only that you were a part of history, but there was a spirit there that was powerful and moving. The only thing that mattered was to do the laundry that day. One of the great Zen teachings in spiritual growth is learning to "chop wood, carry water". Brother Lawrence in the Christian tradition called it "practicing the presence". Either way, the point was to focus on the task at hand and to do it well and do it with heart.

Not one of my grandparents were careless. Everything they did, they did with loving attention. Grandma Poplin paid close attention to the cutting of patterns and then the stitching together of her quilts. Both grandpas made sure that when they planted the corn or the beans that the rows were straight and kept weed free. I can seen Grandma Whitley out hoeing the garden now. Every morning, when the wash was done it was time to get out the hoe and make sure the weeds were kept down.

We have one life today, this one. Pay attention to this day. Now is the time you have. What does your garden look like? Is there laundry to be done? Do you need time to sit on grandma's lap or watch grandpa work at the turning lathe? Today is the day. What is it teaching you? What in your concrete world shows you the mystery of life?