Different soils

This is not exactly a garden update, but it is inspired by the garden.

I have planted it now. If you will recall, I had worked in a cubic foot of good soil, and I had turned over the regular soil before that, and when I was putting in the seeds I worked that area with a trowel, and was really impressed by how efficiently that broke up the soil. Imagine my dismay when on my next visit, after some rain, the soil looked all hard and solid again.

Again, in this area the soil is very clay-like. It takes a lot of work to get good crops. And often where you have that naturally soft and rich loam, I think that happens in flood plains, where there are other problems. I am glad not to live in a flood plain, but now I am wondering if any seeds will even be able to sprout and poke their way through, and if water will make it to the roots, and I tried doing some minor aeration, but it felt ineffective.

The stresses and worries of gardening, about which I am apparently quite neurotic, will come out in other posts, but this is mainly about the parable of the sower, as found in Mark 4 and Matthew 13. I have taught lessons on this before, and we have talked about how all of the unreceptive soils could be changed to be more receptive, but I hadn't really thought about the aspect of staying receptive. Soft soil can turn hard again really quickly.

I should have known. Weeds certainly spring up quickly again after having been cleared out. I knew that. You would think that once you have cleared stones out they would stay cleared out, but sometimes the way there are stones where there clearly should be none, I don't know, maybe they can come back. And soil can definitely harden again, far more quickly than you would think.

I suspect that for all the appearances, it is actually not quite as hard as it was before. Also, I could have worked it more, and those are all things that I will try and learn about and read about, because after all, this is my learning year. If I don't get much of a crop, but I learn enough to have a better one next year, that is acceptable.

It also won't be the end of my learning. I should learn a lot this year, where the increase in knowledge is notable, but that won't be the end of it.

My spiritual receptivity is going to be like that too. I have gone through various periods of refinement, and sometimes I know when it is happening, but not always, but it is not the end. My heart can soften, and then it can harden again. I can get too busy and careworn, and then simplify, and then start finding good causes and get too busy again. There's a back and forth push and pull as we try and get it right.

And, even the rocky, hardened weedy patch may produce some good fruit, just less than if it were better worked. I am working on it.