I went to visit my Mom for her birthday . . . back to the town I grew up in and the house we moved into when I was four years old, in the summer when Neil Armstrong took his “giant leap for mankind.” I know I was placed in front of a black and white TV to watch that momentous event, but I don’t really remember it. My memories from that time are much simpler.

I remember meeting the other children that lived on our block. They came to play in our wild yard, tangled with forgotten plants that had medicinal properties. The elderly man my parents bought the house from had been a pharmacist in a time when people still knew the benefits of nature. I loved the smell of the leaves and flowers and the soil, the earth as God intended it to be.

Across the street were two small empty lots. One was a field of grass we’d play ball in. The other was left over from a tragedy, a death that took away a family’s dream of living next door to each other. The foundation had been dug out and then abandoned. Years later shrubs and small trees grew around the rectangular hole, and rainwater created a small pond. We children would tie strings onto sticks and go “fishing” and have great adventures in that tiny patch of wilderness. After watching Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom on Sunday evening, we’d pretend that our little wilderness was full of huge animals and we were on a safari! That family’s grief became a blessing for us kids.

In actuality, there were a lot of squirrels and house sparrows and pigeons, but not much else. I grew up in the shadows of the New York City skyline, on a street parallel to a noisy highway, five miles from the George Washington Bridge. But my soul always hungered for the earth, the plants, the animals that God created.

It was a different, more innocent time and I spent many of my days two blocks away at my great aunt’s home on the other side of that noisy highway. She’d often call me down from my perch on a high branch in her cherry tree, pin a dollar in my pocket and send me to the little grocery store on the corner for bread and a quart of milk. I felt so important and grown up. And I liked walking by myself through my world, looking at all the trees in peoples’ yards.

I have vague memories of walking up to the house on the corner of our block. The huge home that now stands behind it was still a plot of land, fenced in, a tiny yard with goats and chickens. I remember being sad when the animals left because the old man had passed away.

But there was still happiness and tranquility in the often tumultuous time that was my early childhood. It was in our backyard, or in that tiny wilderness across the street, or in Auntie’s cherry tree. Yet most of all, it was in a beautiful almost acre of land on a hill just across the road from where the farm animals had been.

In those days the land was sadly abandoned and overgrown. But it was to our advantage! It was another bit of wilderness where we could temporarily be heroes and villains as our imaginations churned out exciting adventures. Sometimes I’d go by myself and sit in the shade against the trunk of an old tree. I didn’t really know how to pray then, but I somehow knew that God was there with me in those moments.

When the months got cold and our world was covered in deep snow, all the kids in the neighborhood would drag sleds up to that hill and spend hours climbing up then flying down what seemed like a tall slope but was maybe 5-6 feet high. Then we’d hurry home, shivering, with cold toes and soaked mittens, anticipating the sweet hot cocoa Mom would make for us. And I’d anticipate the coming Spring and the return of the green leaves and wildflowers that were still asleep under the snow, just as all the souls slept under that beautiful, untamed, hallowed ground…

That tiny wild oasis I loved to play and daydream in was, in actuality, a forgotten graveyard. We all knew what it was… “the cemetery.” But we didn’t think about it as anything but a place to play. There was the occasional prank when an older kid would tease a younger one by taking them to a pile of weeds and uncovering a fallen gravestone. For the most part, though, we just stayed away from the few spots we knew had hidden gravestones.

Until I grew up, I never knew the history, or even the name, of “the cemetery.” It was eventually restored by some wonderful people, and an iron fence and gate were placed around it to deter any more vandalism. Historical markers were set up. In 1985, the county took over the maintenance of the site. The wilderness of my childhood faded into the past. But it was time for bigger and better things.

As my spiritual journey continues, I’ve learned to walk with Jesus from my emotional wilderness to the Promised Land of His Word. I feel the love and anguish as I read of our Lord praying in the Garden of Gethsemane, a tranquil place among the trees where He chose to be while conversing with the Father. And I feel again that connection to the Spirit, that peace I had as a child sitting in the shade of a tree in Gethsemane Cemetery.

I still have my love for the nature that God created for us, and my soul is stirred every time I look out to the world I’ve been blessed to live in. The mountains I now call home far surpass the small hill I sledded down. The imaginary animals of my youth are now actual wildlife roaming through our yard… black bear, deer, foxes, raccoons, opossums, more species of birds than I can count, including bald eagles! And I’m reminded of God’s promises…

¹⁸ “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past.

¹⁹ See, l am doing a new thing! 

Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?

I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.

Isaiah 43:18-19

(Note: Here’s an interesting article on Gethsemane Cemetery)