Baby Dirt and the Opposite of War

Now that we’re in our own house and have a little more yard space than we did both at our apartment and our last house, Adam and I have been talking about having a garden.  We don’t exactly have vast amounts of time on our hands, but we are going to at least try to tackle a couple of beds.  When Amelia was smaller, we planted some seeds in a few pots and she adorably called it our “baby dirt.”  She constantly wanted to water it, check on it and of course, play in it.  During that round of gardening, Amelia was the equivalent of Lenny from Of Mice and Men.  Needless to say, we didn’t quite reap what we thought we sowed. 

This time around, Amelia interest was piqued again.  We started our little project today with some seed started pots.  Eleanor bounced between attempting to eat dirt, trying to help and doing her best to escape our porch to get to the back yard.  Amelia, however, stuck with it.  She poured dirt, planted seeds, and watered them all.  I had expected her to tire out or lose interest, but it didn’t happen.  We had a few mishaps of accidentally spilling a couple of the pots, being very concerned about a beetle, dumping almost all of one type of seeds in one pot and insisting on filling up the last few pots with a spoon.   All that aside, she saw it through. 

After we finished, Adam mentioned the “baby dirt” to Amelia and in the true nature of someone who is over three and a half; she insisted that it isn’t baby dirt anymore.  With kids, so much changes so quickly. 

It was a beautiful day to plant seeds.  Amelia made the beginning of a garden today.  Hopefully, if all goes as planned, we will be able to nurture those seeds into plants.  In so doing, she and I were literally planting proverbial seeds (may I remind you that cliches are cliches for a reason) for childhood memories and maybe a new and lasting interest.  

We all want that, in our own way; to make something.  I have hopes to raise my girls to create.  Mark in Rent had it right when he sang from the top of a table, “the opposite of war isn’t peace, it’s creation.” We all work from the spark of our creation towards creation of our own.  My girls will know that they have the power, the value and the calling to make something.  They can make space, make decisions, make art, make a stand, make peace. So can we.

That feels even more significant this weekend.  Tonight, I hugged my girls a little tighter, rocked a little longer, read one extra chapter and deeply felt gratitude that my girls are safe.  There are children (and men and women) who desperately tried to sleep, not to a white noise machine and a harried rendition of “Baby Mine,” but to the soundtrack of an air raid over their home. Don’t let this be just another day; to create space for those who are persecuted, we can’t keep them at arms’ length or only on our social media feeds.  We are called to make true connections and to create peace.