Moments In the Sun

"What are you doing, Mama?"
"I'm planting seeds for the garden."
"Can I help?"
"Yup."
"Will you please move your foot so I can sit there?"
"Sure."
"Oh, sank you!"

She plops onto the edge of the driveway at my feet.

"What do I do?"
"Will you please scoop some of this dirt into that pot?"
"Okay"

"Now what?"
"I will add some mushroom compost and you can stir it up like soup."
"Ewww!"  She grins.  She likes mixing the dirt.

We load some small seed starting pots with our mix.

"Now what, Mama?"
"Now you put one seed in each space and put a little dirt over it."
"Oh, okay.  These seeds look like mushrooms!"
"They're pepper seeds.  Bhut Jolokia, very hot Ghost Peppers."
"Are we growing these for Papa?"
"Some for Papa and some for Mr. Ric."
"Will YOU eat them?"
"Not me - I don't like my mouth on fire!"

She laughs.

"There, I did all mine, now what, Mama?"
"Now we mark them and put them on the table in the sun."

She carefully carries her little six-pack to the table.  I mark them with old plastic cutlery on which I write the names of the plants. She thinks that's funny.

We plant more kinds of peppers - jalapeno, poblano, purple bell.
"These seeds look like mushrooms, too!  All the pepper seeds look like mushrooms.  How come they don't look like peppers?"
"Perhaps they're in disguise."
"Like the Flash so no one knows who he is."
"Sure."

"What's in THESE ones, Mama?"  She points to more pots on the table.
"Some lettuce, some spinach, some Bells of Ireland I planted because of Mama Ra."

"I sink I want to take a taste of some lettuce with my dinner when it grows."
"You will try some of our lettuce?"
"YES!!!"

We finish up for the day.

"Will we plant more tomorrow, Mama?"
"Yup, we will.  Will you help me?"
"YES!!!  Umm...what will we plant?"
"Tomatoes and cucumbers and sunflowers and maybe some beans, and catnip..."
"Wow, that's a LOT!!!  We are going to have an ENORMOUS garden!!!  Papa will sink it is the biggest, best garden ever!!!  We will feed EVERYONE!!!!!  I'm going to go play now."

Off she flies on her scooter, hair streaming behind her, bits of earth crumbling from her hands.

"...and okra and squash and..."