Not just food for the body

I guess I am what most would call a hobby gardener, although my wife might differ on that. This is my second year and I have been looking forward to it since a few weeks after I finished the last canning in the late fall. I suppose like most, I knew what I wanted to plant, it was just a matter of which varieties of tomatoes and beans and carrots and, well you know the rest. In my line of work, I spend a lot of time traveling and dealing with people, occasionally with crises like the text yesterday about the mother being admitted to the hospital  for congestive heart failure, and my being scheduled to be away for the next four days. And so, the garden has become a refuge in a way. Early in the morning, often as the sun is still behind the mountain, I can walk the rows with my three dachshunds, they really are great grub hunters not to mention I have never seen a badger in the yard (dachshund translates “badger hound”) and take in the cool morning air with the sound of the song birds and the occasional call of a wild turkey.   To be able to realize that all the rioting and disasters, crime and pettiness one hears on the morning news are far away, at least for the moment. Looking at the rows of beans sewn last week, green is breaking through the soil, new life and new hope for another year.  This patch of tilled earth will provide ample food for my family and that of our daughter and her sons not to mention so much more that will be given away, we could never eat all that will spring forth from this little plot of ground, but on those mornings as I walk the rows, it is not food for the body that I receive, but food for the soul, being one with the creator. Soon it will be time to head off to help fifteen teenagers and their adult leaders spend the day repairing a rotten floor or a leaking roof, but for now, among the new fruit of the earth life is quiet and peaceful and one’s thoughts can be collected. All because some small round seeds were placed back where all life started, this small round ball we call our island home we call earth.