My mother was the tenth of eleven children growing up on an Ohio farm in the 1920s. Most of what they needed came from the earth on that farm, including the farmhouse built by her grandfather. The bricks were shaped from the clay of their creek bed, fired in their field kiln, and laid in straight courses by his hands. One of my mother's childhood chores was to run to the spring house to fetch a bucket of milk or a stoneware crock of food immersed in the cold water of their artesian well. The thought of that artesian spring house has always stayed with me when I sift through the stories she told of farm life in earlier times.
An artesian spring flows up from the depths naturally, breaking through the surface of the earth of its own accord. It comes from deep in the aquifer, where pressure from the earth itself pushes clear, pure water upward. It is an image that inspires me when I sit at my desk to write.
Writing is an artesian spring that flows up from the depths of the psyche. Every soul has an aquifer of creativity at its centre and that wellspring is ever seeking a path toward expression.
~K L Kurtz
*Spring house photos of Joseph Schneider Haus, Kitchener, Ontario. Courtesy of Joanna Rickert-Hall. Joanna's blog.
*Photo below is the old farmhouse from my family. The second photo is the same home, circa 2004, when the young couple (not relatives) who currently owned the property graciously invited my mother and her siblings to have a reunion at the old homestead. The stories that were told that afternoon! The generous invitation was extended for many years, and it was always such a meaningful time for the elderly siblings to be gathered where they'd grown up.
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