What is it about that bright red shock of color rising into the silvery gray winter sky that beckons to me every time I set eyes on it? I take one look at it, and it transports me to another time — a time in which one’s simple surroundings were all that was necessary for a life of meaning and purpose. These Michigan barns stand in homage to a life which most of us won’t ever really know, but may secretly envy.

Every time I see one of these Michigan beauties, I yearn for a simpler life. To live off of the land, to get my hands dirty, to cook what I have grown, to sit by a fire which warms both heart and home and to look around a dinner table at the souls who make the life and the work worth all the effort...where have those days gone?

I guess I wouldn’t romanticize the agrarian age quite so much if I had to walk outside in the middle of winter to get water from a pump or to frequent an outhouse; but with all of the many advances that I absolutely appreciate, I feel that we are losing sight of something that needs to be salvaged in order to truly progress as a society. Sometimes, progress means letting go of hyper-productivity and just slowing down to respond to the needs of the people around us. Sometimes it means that we need to turn off the technology, to un-plug and just connect with people — to choose humanity over a cyber-reality.

I know that I plead guilty to this shortsightedness myself at times. I also know that there has to be a balance, and that work has to get done, but I think that most of us are doing too much and making our goals so unrealistic that the only possible means to achieving them is in shutting out the world around us. There is a real need for joy and laughter and time to be human, and I resolve in this new year to make time for those things which keep us human, which separate us from machines and which give us a joy which can only be realized in the moments of being totally present to the people around us.

Moira Cullen co-owns with husband John Cullen, Celtic Gardens, a design/build garden firm in Dexter. She is a homeschooling mother of four very energetic children. To learn more, visit http://www.celticgardenimports.com.