The more I work the land of the small food garden I created in our building’s’ yard, the more connected I feel to it. The more I engage with it, the more invested I feel in its upkeep and growth.
I was watering the plot tending to the lettuce’, melon’, zucchini’, and tomato’ seedlings I planted in the garden some four weeks ago.
And yesterday, as I was watering the garden what do I see?
I see many more seedlings growing out of nowhere on my plot, seedlings I had not planted. Then who had?
Where did these new seedlings come from? I asked myself.
-“I am positive I did not plant them. I did put a wooden stick by the seedlings, I planted. And these don’t have a stick by them.” I answered my doubting voice.
Then, I started replaying the process as it was recorded in my mind’s tape: “First, you watered the land,” I heard it say. “Then you dug it up to get oxygen flowing through it. Then you added the compost to nourish the soil, and only then did you plant the seedlings. Finally you added the sticks that enabled you to see them and water them,” I heard through my mind’s recorder.
Upon retracing the steps, a eureka moment hit me.
A sense of light, a sense of joy, a sense of connecting the dots. A realization of sorts.
Aha! I finally “saw.”
The new seedlings were none other than seeds embedded in our compost that had grown thanks to watering.
A few days earlier, I had watched a short film, which now I understand, helped me in connecting the dots.
The film showed how one can basically grow most vegetables back from the parts of vegetables usually cut and disposed. Like the seeds in the red pepper, like the “hairy” roots of the green onions, and leeks, like the very end of the carrot and the garlic leading to the root that you usually do not eat.
There were all these nutrients in the compost, I figured now, so many seeds of disposed vegetables. Of their lower and inedible ends that had ended in our compost and were now regrowing magically in our food garden.
Aha!
The life-force embedded in our compost filled me with awe. The life-force embedded in our garbage fills me with awe.
I am awe-struck with nature’s innate design to reproduce itself, easily and effortlessly.
I am moved to my bone, by all the “gold” that lies hidden in my garbage, for the “gold” in my compost, a “gold” that is free and accessible to all.
Seeing that the universe was designed to give plentiful in abundance at no cost moves me.
Nature’s design comes unwrapped, raw, with no transportation costs, and no waste. It is a zero waste design, and I love it!
Now when I water the plot, I have got accustomed to look for all kinds of new seedlings popping up. Seedlings that I never planted myself. New tomato seedlings, potato, zucchini and all the vegetables we had enjoyed over the last year make their appearance one by one and join the gang.
I am grateful for nature’s abundant giving. It fills me with joy!
I do not know how you feel about all of this but to me it feels like telling you: “Hey look, I found “gold” in my garbage!”
From Jerusalem with love,
Yvette Nahmia-Messinas
Wondering where did the
Greek-Jewish was in
Jerusalem in the 1920s?
Dear John,
Please clarify, I don’t understand what you are asking. Are you asking whether there were Greek Jews in Jerusalem in the 1920s? Most of the Greeks at that time in Jerusalem were Christians and not Jews.
Best,
Yvette