The Game of Risk

The game of risk. We play it every day.

The rows sustain our very lives and the hills that are the backdrop for these rows is our reward for the labor and the worry, the stress and the strain.

In winter’s snow and cold, we retreat to our house. As we sit by the fire, we watch the snow gradually cover last year’s rows – eventually to melt with spring’s rain, saturating the soil below. The soil will stockpile the moisture – hopefully long enough to sustain the rows through the hot summer months.

Spring brings with it the readying time, where much thought and energy is put into planning each and every row. The weather must cooperate for the rows to sprout and flourish. We must have sun to warm the soil, and rain to hydrate the seeds in the ground.

With the hot sun of July comes the threat of unwanted predators which may jeopardize the rows, and the lack of rain, which causes the rows to curl and burn while every bit of moisture reserve from the soil is evaporated.

We pray for rain. But not too much. It can rain on our picnic, we don’t care. Because we know that without rain, the rows will die and the hills will no longer belong to us. We pray for others in times of their misfortune – too much rain which drowns the rows – because we know that they are just as vulnerable as we are – and that they also have hills they are fighting to protect.

Finally fall harvest comes – it is an ending time, when we will at last determine the success of the rows and see our fate. As the evening comes more quickly, and the cool autumn air sends a welcome chill through us, we wash the soil of the rows from our hands until next spring.

When we will do it all over again.

The risk never goes away. It is there every day of the year – but the hills that are the backdrop for the rows remain – an ever beautiful sign of just why we take the risk again and again.