Gardening the Soul: The Harvest, 7

The Expectations of the Harvest

One seed catalog described several varieties of the same vegetable: "adds zest to salads," "most astonishing," "out-standing tenderness," "bursting with flavor and nutrition," "distinctive flavor." Which exotic vegetable were they describing? The green bean! All these tinseled descriptions make it difficult to know what a mature garden looks or tastes like.

Many of us are no less ignorant of the flavor of a mature relationship. Mildred Walker's novel, Winter Wheat, tells the story of Ellen Webb—the only child of her American father and her Russian mother. While attending college, Ellen fell in love with Gil, a young man who came to her farm home for a summer visit. But after a shortened stay, he bolted home. When mom tried to comfort Ellen, Ellen exploded, blaming her parents’ marriage for Gil’s departure:

"I'm not like you, Mom, so I'd do anything to get a man to marry me!” Mom looked at me so blankly it made me all the angrier. “Don't look as though you didn't know what I was talking about. I know how you tricked Dad. I overheard you the night after Gil left. I know he married you and took you to America because you told him you were pregnant. And when he knew you weren't going to have a child it was too late. He was married to you, and he was too honorable to go away and leave you." I couldn't seem to stop. I watched my words fall like blows on Mom's face.

"And you've gone on all these years hating each other. Gil felt that hate. He could tell just being here. That's one of the things that drove him away from here, from me." I almost choked on my own words. I guess I was crying. Mom was still so long I looked up at her. All the color had gone out of her face, except in her eyes. She shook her head. "You don't know anything, Yelena. In our church if baby is not christened we say she go blind in next world. I think you go blind in this world—blind dumb! She stopped and then went on slowly. "No, Yelena, I never hate Ben `an Ben don't hate me. I love him here so all these years!" Mom touched her breast and her face broke into life. Her eyes were softer, "Me hate Ben"! She laughed.

Mom explained that she had deceived her father. But it was only because she was seventeen, in love, and had already lost all of her family during World War I. Though Ben was upset by her deception, his love wouldn't allow him to hold a grudge. Mom looked at Ellen and sighed: “Yolochka, you don't know how love is yet."

What does a healthy marriage look like? a healthy friendship? Many of us hold a ripe friendship in our hands but don't recognize it because it has a few blemishes. As Jesus agonized over his date with the cross, he confessed to his disciples, Peter, James and John: "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death." As he strained to obey the Father's will, he im-plored his friends to keep watch and pray. But his friends promptly fell asleep--not once, not twice, but three times! How many of us would hang onto friends who snored through the crisis of our lives? Though certainly disappointed, Jesus knew his friends' hearts: "The spirit is willing, but the body is weak." All mature relationships have frequent failings.