Co. Longford farmer and author, John Connell, has just had his fifth book ‘Twelve sheep: Life lessons from a lambing season’ published.
The scene is set in early autumn as John stands in the sheep shed of the family farm. Before him are 12 hoggets, bought from his parents with the proceeds of his book sales.
The main reason he bought the Suffolk crosses was, he said, that they are a stake in the future, but also that they challenge you to live in the now.
He is interested in the journey from youth to motherhood and the lessons that can be learned.
Lessons
Before getting the sheep, he was suffering from what he calls a fatigue, one that was perhaps soulful as much as physical.
He had finished a book and found himself spent. After considering leaving the land, he had an internal vision where he could see himself with 12 sheep, walking upon the earth as a shepherd in the cathedral of nature.
This book, John said, will be a record of that particular time in the life of the sheep and this land and living of ours.
With his home in Birchview at the centre of things, he takes us back on some of his travels including northern Spain, and the US where he met a woman called Maria who told him the shocking reason behind her involvement in farm worker movements.
Addressing a whole range of issues from life and death; to climate change; rural decline and rural revival; the need for connection; the value of waiting; the experience of migrants; the merit of labour; and being with nature, he shares the lessons he has learned in the sheep shed.
His flock’s journey from youth to motherhood has been a hopeful one for the author.
“We have come through the season, they and I. We must all of us pick up the fallen bales of life, again and again, making a haystack of living that is tight and strong,” he said.
“Love and time have brought us this far. Now it is up to nature. That is my last lesson,” he mused.