Harvesting Your Sweetest Dreams this Spring.
"Reach high, for stars lie hidden in your soul. Dream deep, for
every dream precedes the goal." ~ Pamela Vaull Starr
The days are getting longer now and the sun sits higher in the
sky. The sugar maples stretch after a long cold winter. Soon
their sweet sap will run and fires will be lit at maple
sugarhouses for all night boiling vigils. The fires must be
continually stoked, babied and watched. Dreams are cooking. You
can see the evidence as white smoke billows out from the
rooftops of maple sugarhouses and sweet steam rises filling the
air. The farmer's dream is to boil the sap collected from the
maple tree into maple syrup in a span of 4 to 6 weeks.
If you ever visit a sugarhouse during boiling season I think you
will find a happy crew of farmers, neighbors and friends talking
about the past winter and making predictions for this year's
maple season. People support one another during the long boiling
time while the dream is cooking. Making maple syrup is not a
enture "to go alone" as the process is demanding. Temperatures
have to be watched, the fires can't go out and every year the
season depends on just the right weather conditions.
The farmer's job is to be ready with lines tapped into the sugar
maples, enough wood to keep the evaporator boiling the sap and
good company with people who share their passion. In the end,
the farmer's dream of making maple syrup will coming pouring
down on our pancakes and waffles.
We can learn a lot from the maple sugar farmer about cooking
dreams. Like the farmer, if we are going to realize our dreams,
we must make them a priority. We need to stay focused by keeping
our attention on the end result; the maple syrup. Always share
the boil time with other passionate dreamers. It makes the
eventual obstacles and distractions easier to overcome and
passion is contagious. Most of all be flexible;the weather isn't
always predictable.
Just as the farmer has modernized the process of collecting and
boiling sap to be more efficient, we may need to upgrade and
look for additional tools and resources to make our dreams a
reality.
Remember some dreams, like maple syrup, come with an expiration
date. If we don't do something about them they will eventually
evaporate in the bucket.