Recent events remind me to consider time.  Last evening as I was putting out hay, a fox sauntered by quite close on his way to Kimi’s where he knows there will be a treat hidden in the wood pile. Today, a bald eagle is feasting on a catch from the pond. I hope it’s one of those giant koi fish Mark dumped in when the children were babies. I sit at home tending to the old Labrador whose hind end has given out but who wags her tail and downs her food happily in between walks like a wheel barrow with a wood carrier sling and my aching arms for support. 

 

She measures my time – the time from when the children were teenagers to the present, when they are well on their way and, for the moment, no longer living on the farm to welcome the fox, the eagle, and to walk slowly by the old lab on her wanderings to and fro. Time is the seasons, the children growing, the passing of the pets, the hours on the tractor, the spring wheat, the saplings grown, a loft full of hay, the long list of horses now gone, and saying goodbye to parents as we lean forward to take their places.

 

The land has its own sense of time and it moves imperceptibly – a seeming constant. It wraps its arms as I struggle with the goodbyes and exalt in the wildlife, the farm, and the animals with which I spend my days. It takes time to preserve what we have here. We received news from the County this week that we have a new easement – on land purchased incredibly 24 years ago for that purpose - two Labradors ago. The County fulfilled its promise to the land while it patiently waited. Thank you.

 

Time has its own dimension in our work. Thirty thousand acres ago, a group of people had the foresight to protect the farms of North Baltimore County. Bit by bit, with help from the County, the State, the work of the VPC and interested individuals an area of over forty square miles has been preserved. Its our time to be sure that we protect the commitments to the land, to our children’s children, and to expand the protection to areas north – an area of farming and big woods  abutting the reservoir which supplies the city with its nourishment. The farms feed us and the land, forest, and stream are a haven for the fox, the eagle, and the fish.  

 

There are times, however, when we cannot be patient, when we are compelled to look forward. Now is one of those times. If you can do one thing this year of great importance: appreciate your rural surroundings and know the land will wait for you – get involved and act. The health of the nation, of your family, and of the land depend on it. The election is six short months away – it cannot wait. 

 

For this issue, I invited two neighbors to consider their relationship with the land. I hope you enjoy. 

 

 

 

Victoria Campbell Collins

President, The Land Preservation Trust, Inc. 

March 9, 2024