Still finding flowers
April 16 2025
Their friends had met them at a little deli about an hour away. Pete’s Deli, Houston.
Filly saw signs for all kinds of meats and sandwiches and treats and when she walked into the deli store, there were jellies, including hot pepper jelly which she had recently decided she loved, after trying a hot pepper jelly from The belted Goat in Fearrington Village NC.
She seated herself at a rickety table in the far back right side of the store, and looked into the glass case at the fresh potato salads, cold cubed watermelon and green grated coleslaw. The place was small and not fancy, but it was friendly and the food looked wonderful. There were also homemade chocolate macadamia nut coconut cookies and cakes like Red velvet and chocolate.
The menu was full of different sandwiches and Filly chose the BLT and got chips, and watermelon to accompany the meal and a plastic carton of un-sweet ice tea, full of “the good ice”.
Their friends arrived and they talked about the garden Jack was cultivating and how he planned to sell some of the plants at their upcoming garage sale. He grew tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, squash, herbs and more and his garden was prolific.
The conversation turned to other topics including their five children and Filly’s five children. If children were flowers, then both families had done a good job of cultivating their “gardens”. They enjoyed a three hour lunch conversation and then drove the hour long drive back home.
The next morning as she walked in the early morning coolness, Filly thought more about gardens as an allegory for new life. People were readying their gardens and yards for Easter, and Filly marveled at the beauty and creativity demonstrated. One home had planted creeping junipers to border a flower bed and the natural shape of the junipers harmonized with the rocks and the shape of the land.
One yard had rainbow shaped bunnies. Filly loved bright colors and yet the “capture” of the rainbow image by an organization that Filly felt did not honor God’s laws made that “yard art” not one of her favorites. Other yards had rich thick green grass like a carpet, with bird baths and flowing fountains. The flowers that were blooming were like bright red trumpets, blasting out the good news, that Jesus had risen.
As she walked and listened to the birds twitter, and watch cars pass by, some waving, some smiling, some staring straight ahead, (Filly was the smile and wave type), She caught a glimpse of a tiny group of flowers bordering one yard, as part of a cluster of clover. The stem of the flower was miniscule and delicate. That fragility of the stem was what interested Filly. STEM as an acronym meant Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. So many things went into the formation of a flower, if seeing it as an allegory.
She kept thinking about gardens and flowers as she finished her ten thousand steps and got back home, and sat at the table with her mug of hot chocolate, made with milk and ovaltine.
She had not drank coffee or much tea the day before so she had enjoyed a restful night compared to the sleepless night before. She ate a banana and then curled up on the sofa with her computer to write, but could not resist sinking back down into the warm blankets for a twenty minute nap as she had gotten up at five thirty am.
She awakened to the sound of a weed wacker buzzing and the worker who was doing the garden work was also singing out loud to himself.
Filly had planted the flowers and shrubs and had created the garden to the best of her ability. This outside help to maintain the garden was what allowed Filly to have time to use her other skills, like writing, as well.
She wondered, what if there was a garden where someone planted seeds but then dug up the new plants and threw them away before they had a chance to grow and mature. That was what abortion was Filly thought. Just as thoughtless and tragic.
What if there was a garden where someone used an abundance of chemicals to kill all growth to keep it free from weeds and bugs such as roundup, so that nothing remained but a patch of dirt where nothing would grow…That was what Birth control drugs were Filly thought. So many who had used these drugs, were now not able to conceive or grow their own “garden”.
That must be why the bible said in parable, to let the tares and the wheat grow together…and at the harvest, the wheat would be bundled into the barn and the tares would be cut and burned.
This did not mean that the farmers or gardeners would just let weeds overrun the garden as they would dig up and pull the weeds that they could see. But the tares looked SO similar to wheat on the outside and it was only at harvest that one bore fruit and the other did not.
The tares, apparently are poison. And their roots are entangled with the wheat roots so they are very difficult to uproot without destroying the wheat.
Filly thought about this because in life, it might look like the evil things are keeping pace with the good things. But God wants the good to thrive, take in sun and the rain and produce good fruit, giving no space to the tares. Filly wondered if too much energy focused on destroying the tares, prevents the wheat from achieving its potential.
Apparently now there are harvesting machines that can separate wheat from its poisonous mimic. Filly thought that AI also might be able to accomplish such a task with humans as well…separating those who would hurt mankind from those who would embrace mankind.
But what if there were people who thought that it was ok to go in the night and plant tares in another man’s pure wheat garden? Wouldn’t that be like raping children, or allowing criminals to sneak illegitimately into a country? The bible story was saying that those who did something illegitimate, would not profit. The letter of the law and the spirit of the law seemed to be at odds.
It was interesting Filly thought, that the problem of fertility in a garden, appears to start by using chemicals randomly to prevent growth, the same way chemicals were used by women who wanted to have random sexual partners, had prevented pregnancy. The chemicals were efficient, but the law was still there, and put in place for a reason, to protect gardens and women, not to sterilize them.
The same way the identification of a child as a embryo versus identifying a preborn infant as a child were at odds with each other. Abortion had been marketed to people by calling babies a clump of cells which was an ironic contrast to the the way IVF was marketed to people, calling embryos a viable baby and charging as much or more than twenty grand for the privilege of implanting a woman who could otherwise not have a child. Isn’t it ironic, doncha think?
What was the purpose of toxic chemicals marketed to women so they could have unrestricted sex, only for many to learn later that they also could not have children? What was the purpose of creating a virus that altered DNA so that fertility problems arose? What was the purpose of bringing in criminals into “the wheat fields” other than to destroy what was good?
Filly knew that these analogies by Jesus were extremely helpful. The tiny flower she had seen on her walk with its fragile neck was still alive and well. And in spite of appearances to the otherwise, he good that was Godly was also alive and well.
Filly had some proclamations to make.
1)Big pharma that had become a false god would lose its influence over mankind.
2)The marketing of babies, and abortion of babies using gene selection while avoiding marriage between man and woman, would also end. Parenthood between married fathers and mothers, forming complete families would thrive.
3)Sexual infidelity, and the sexual revolution, would be condemned by men and women alike as being an evil which had ultimately failed to prevent a beautiful and bountiful harvest and indeed good would triumph.
All this in Jesus name.
It was the “words made flesh” that she listened to. No matter how many tares, good is what dwells among us.
For more reading…
https://thegirdedmind.org/2022/01/08/good-seed-or-drunk-weed/