Listening in class yesterday, I keep thinking about the number one value that I had written down. I was trying to decide where it came from. Who taught it to me? Did it come to me on my own? This value isn't usually one that we associate with European values. It has only been during the past few years that Earth Day has become the "in" thing to do, but my respect for the environment seems to have planted itself in me from roots branching out all over. And more and more, I see the lack of respect that we humans have for each other; people pushing in line to get to the salad bar quicker. People weaving in and out of traffic on the interstate just to make it to their destination five minutes earlier. Does it make them feel better to be first? Slow down. Just enjoy time.
My grandfather was one of my biggest influences, and it wasn't really anything he ever said that caught my attention. It was what he did. Every year he had a garden. Some seeds he had saved from the last year's harvest, and some he bought. Some seeds he traded with his brothers and his friends, but before he planted those seeds he had to cultivate the ground. He added what he called "fertilize," but in actuality, it was the most terrible smelling cow manure. I don't know where he got it from, but when I would come home from school on one warm day in spring, the entire hill would smell like a dairy farm. "Yeah it stinks," he'd say, "but the tomatoes love it."
And we all loved his tomatoes. They were the best tomatoes in Henderson county. I've never tasted another like one of those that came from my grandfather's garden.
He would take something natural, something considered waste and use it to replenish the materials in the soil that the tomatoes needed to grow, and then he would add his own sweat.
Pappaw knew that in order to get the best tomatoes in the county, he couldn't just let them alone. They had to be tended. He weeded. He mounded the dirt around the base of the plant. He made sure every tiny plant had a stake or a cage in which to climb. If the sky failed to provide rain, Pappaw would hook up the soaker hose. By June, the plants burst with red fruit, and all summer long we would have fresh tomatoes for our grilled hamburgers and tommy toes for our salads. Pappaw would give away the excess, and Mom and Grandma would can the rest of the bounty. ...And he would just give them away.
That was one thing that took me a long time to understand. How can he put in all that work, and then just give away all that he worked for? And why work that hard in the first place? He could have put in half the work and gotten more than enough for him and his family. He did it because he enjoyed it. He did it because he respected his fellow man, and he understood that others may not have the means to make their own garden, whether the reason be land, physical ability, or time. But I think that he recognized that he had a talent given to him by God, and he used that talent to provide a service to others. He respected them enough not to ask them for a dime.
In writing this piece, I have come to a new realization about my grandfather. He loved his fellow man enough to give them his time and his product, and I really need to strive more to be like him. Providing service to others has never been my strong suit, always claiming that I don't have the time. The Sacred Tree says, "True happiness comes only to those who dedicate their lives to the service of others."
Every time my grandfather passed a bulging bag of vegetables to a friend in need, he would do so with a big grin on his face, and I know that he was truly happy.
No comments:
Post a Comment