spring has sprung

This past Saturday, I finally figured out my calling in life: to be a farm wife.

I woke up at about the time night revellers were finally tucked in, and felt anticipation in my bones. Coffee! Shovel! Seeds! called to me, in that order. After a delicious 3-egg omelet with peppers, cheese made by Trappist monks, and rosemary, I headed outside to tackle the 50-foot square area of our parking lot that had been turned into dirt, or rather, a garden.

There is something about solitary manual labor early in the morning that I find invigorating, that reminds me of the joy of having limbs to move, and that infuses purpose into my day as bracing as the caffeine soaking into my bloodstream.

I shoveled four bucketfuls of thick dark compost into the garden, then methodically churned the soil with a spade again and again, plucking out debris, sticks, and rocks that had collected over the winter. As I dug, I was reminded of the veritable magic of organic growth. To think that something as ordinary as dirt can embrace a speck of matter called a seed, and nurture it well enough that all the world's people can be sustained by its fruit is astounding.

Really, all seeds are as magic as Jack's beans. When you drop seeds on the soil, especially really tiny ones like turnip tops or really ugly ones like red beets, even the next second you have to squint because they blend in with the other tiny ugly blobs around them. And to think that an entire plant exists within that seed, waiting to unfold. A brief aside: does not this plant embryology shed light on how we should treat very very young humans, i.e. embryos? The debate about when personhood begins is so heated, but I thought while gardening that if someone waltzed up to me and crushed a few seeds between their fingertips, and proceeded to explain calmly that they had not harmed a plant, merely a seed, I would think them cruel and also illogical. How can I expect to grow beautiful onions if all my seeds are destroyed? And really, if I lose my seeds in the ruckamarole of the garden, and expect blobs of dirt to sprout just as well as onion seeds, my larder will rue the day come winter. In other words, the inner being of seeds really is different than that of other similiar-looking things.

I worked in the garden for about five hours, time interspersed by snippets of Pope Benedict's On Conscience and an icy-pop. By dusk, eight rows lay serene and gently rounded in the garden: snow peas, red beets, onions, turnip tops, bok choy, and carrots. There is still room left for tomatoes and peppers later in the season.

Back to the vocation awareness: I say mostly tongue in cheek that 'farm wife' is my preferred destiny, but I do love the mornings, the labor, the gift of self for the sake of growth, both of plants and people, and the steady rythym of a life tied to the soil is much more appealing than that of an arbitrary city dweller's schedule. For now, I am content to have a chunk of dirt to play in, and I await expectantly the first little shoots that poke through into the Denver sky. More to come as produce develops....