Once upon a time in a sandy Kansas garden, some pumpkin and some gourd seeds were placed gently in the ground and the seeds sprouted and the plants and vines grew green against the dusky dirt.
But the deer didn’t know the plants weren’t for them and the bunnies crept close and the leaves were nibbled and gobbled and the hopeful gardener of gourds and pumpkins was a little annoyed about it.
Still, despite grass that also sprang up {and was ignored by the critters and gardener, too} and bugs who set up housekeeping, hit-and-miss watering and sun beating down, two or three hardy vines grew longer and longer.
Blooms bloomed. Then turned to the beginning of gourds. And grew. As the calendar turned and September took the stage, the gardener gathered gourds.
True, they weren’t the flat, tan pumpkins she was really hoping for. True, there was no variety and bright mix of yellow and orange this year.
But, there was a harvest all the same! Great, green gourds in a lumpy heap to usher in autumn with quiet splendor.
And the gardener was glad and she mused about how life can be a struggle and there can be bugs and chomps and hurts and how hard it can be to keep on and to produce.
And sometimes as she looks back, she realizes the crop she was intent on, wasn’t the fruit the Master Gardener was pruning her for.
It may not always end up the flashiest, or the most breathtaking or as priorly pictured, but sometimes it becomes the most beautiful because of what it endured to become and to bear.
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Words fitly spoken! So enjoyed reading this. Thanks for sharing your musings.
I’m glad you enjoyed it! I am enjoying my green gourds. 😉
I feel as if I’ve just read a parable from a very wise woman! And these words capture my gardener’s heart.
(Some of my best and biggest pumpkins have struggled their way out of the compost pile from seeds that were flung there and survived a Maine winter.)
Thank-you for your kind words! I don’t do a huge amount of gardening, but I’ve had volunteer plants that have thrived as well. You never know!
Here’s to next year and the possibility of a variety of pumpkins and gourds! 🙂
ok this might sound clueless to some people (because I am of course clueless about gardening) but your garden described our garden and I never knew that grass and weeds and all things bad can creep up so fast. It really did bring home to me though the importance of weeding out stuff in my own life but to also know that the harvest we did receive was because of God same with life. I love how you wrote this. It would make a perfect little book. your neighbor at #tellhisstory
Thanks for your kind words.
We’ve grown some garden stuff most years for a lot of years, but I’m still pretty clueless as a gardener! ha! 🙂
The weeds do grow so much easier than the good stuff! Too true in life at times, too!