"If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world."
J. R. R. Tolkien
Dreaming and planning for my second-half-century (if the Lord wills) has been process of hoping we might have the privilege, in this next season of life, to build and inhabit an uncommon place — to extend and expand the rich fellowship and activity of the happy and bustling home that has been for decades our central occupation and calling.
“Maker’s Hollow” — we call this happy place — is a family home (3 families in 3-4 residences), a hospitable home, a gathering place, and the natural habitat of easy laughter and of conversation, without haste or excess propriety.
The vision of this place (settled with family and like-hearted friends), has always been of a village of family industries, a dash of amateur agriculture, the smell of wood-chips, and an attentive supply of good food and drink (a notable bit of it home-grown, raised, or brewed). And here we are, doing just that!
The talking, writing, teaching, singing, strumming, worship, and creative media-making that are the essential fellowship of this place, are crafting together the stories that our lives crave to tell, with all the folks that veer from the road — inadvertently or intentionally — entering this front door.
In atmosphere and activity, community and well-broken-in comfort, and in beauty and peacefulness — we long for this Place to be a mix of the two places pictured above: the place that shaped me and my deepest affections and a place of profound historical connection. The first was formed and nurtured by my father and mother (Zion Hill Bible Conference) and the second (George Washington’s Mount Vernon) reminds me of my father every time I visit.