Tag: parables

More than many potatoes

My garden, if I may say so, is doing great this year. I added many native perennials to my flower beds, but my pride and joy is the food I am growing. My peaches, apples and grapes are bounteous, my pumpkins are unstoppable, carrots are coming in strong, my sweet corn is putting out tassels ahead of schedule, and my various basils, eggplants, garlic, cucumbers and dill are doing yeoman’s work. Even my rhubarb, strawberries and asparagus are still producing a bit, well past their allotted season. 

But for a real thrill, I go and gaze at my potato plants, which are dying. This is good. This is what you want to see at this time of year. A few weeks ago, the stems were sturdy, and the leaves were thick and lush, and when I watered them, they danced and bounced under the shower. But after briefly flowering, the blossoms are now gone, and the leaves are taking on a dusty look, drooping and tired. Soon the leaves will start to fray and dry up, and then they will go brown. That’s how I will know it is time to harvest.

And getting to the point where it is time to harvest is the whole point of growing potatoes. The trick is not to get overly attached to the intermediary stages.

The other trick is understanding that all stages are intermediary stages. 

Omniscient, omnipotent, and a little bit gauche

The wonderful musical Fiddler on the Roof famously begins with the song “Tradition.” Each group in the shtetl – the papas, the mamas, the daughters, the sons – sings a chorus describing their lives. 

“Because of our traditions,” Tevye explains beneficently, “everyone knows who he is, and what God expects him to do.” 

We listened to this soundtrack a lot when I was little, and I never liked the “sons” part. They sing: “At three I started Hebrew school. At ten I learned a trade. I hear they picked a bride for me. I hope… she’s pretty.”  

I asked my mother, “Isn’t that kind of shallow? They shouldn’t be so worried about what their wives look like, should they?” I was a pretty self-righteous kid. I was heavily into stories of the saints at the time, and had heard over and over that beauty is fleeting and God sees the heart, and that’s what really matters.  

My mother, probably hiding a smile, said, “Well. . . it’s true that other things besides beauty matter, but it’s also normal for a young man to want his wife to be pretty, and there’s nothing wrong with that.” I did not like that! I wanted her to say that I was absolutely right, and incredibly spiritually mature for my age. 

I also wanted her to say I was pretty, and I wanted to be pretty, and I wanted to meet a boy who thought I was so pretty, he would ask me to be his wife, and we could be like Tevye and Golde, except I would be pretty. Give me a break, I was like eight. Plus, it was the early 80s, and we were all very dumb.  

My mother was right, though, of course. It’s great to have the highest of high standards, and to strive to dwell in a realm where body and soul are both exclusively and harmoniously ordered toward the good and toward service of God and each other. That’s how it’s supposed to be.  

It’s also great to recognize that most of us simply don’t live in that realm. We have our moments, but there’s nothing especially holy about sneering at normal human desires and impulses, and there’s definitely nothing holy about pretending you’re holy. I eventually figured that out.  

I am now 50, and to be honest, I thought I had gotten over this kind of spiritual snobbery. But a few weeks ago at Mass, I discovered I have not, because both the first reading and the Gospel bothered me a little bit. … Read the rest of my latest for The Catholic Weekly. 

Photo: Otterbein University Theatre & Dance from USA, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons (Creative Commons)