“Basingstoke today after a local woman claimed to have seen a vision of a piece of toast on a picture of the Virgin Mary at her local church. Betty Tilley, 42, was praying silently at the Sacred Heart Catholic church when she looked up to see a ray of light slanting in through the window, illuminating a reproduction painting of the Virgin Mary and as she moved closer she was amazed by what she saw.“‘There’s just no question in my mind that it was a miracle. Right there, on the face of the Holy Mary, Mother of God, I could see a nice piece of toasted sliced white bread. The amazing thing is that it was just like the one I had had for breakfast, so clearly this must be some kind of message from God'.”
Source: New Biscuit
I’ve got to get out to the yard. Like Betty Tilley in the above quote, I’ve been inspired by a secret message from God – In my case, a message directing me to sow seeds and pull weeds. I have a mystical and improvable faith that the act of gardening works a sort of miracle on my mental outlook. I mean, I’m crazy at the best of times, but what I aspire to is a sort of goofy/crazy where I develop hyper sensory powers to see the entire world through a sunny haze of verdant growth rather than the edgy, over-caffeinated slightly menacing jitters that, I presume, were the accompaniment (if not the cause of) Betty Tilley’s vision. I’m more comfortable in my skin when my zaniness is tempered with some of the “good” muscle fatigue that results from turning the compost with a pitchfork, and my upper arms are losing their flab and my lower arms are absorbing the sun’s pure energy.Yesterday, we saw the sun’s rays peeking through clouds and made what my Spousal Unit calls “rapture beams” – those rays that make spotlights of sun through holes in the clouds. One of my crazier sisters used to call it the “Holy Cow” sky after a cartoon that showed one such sunbeam shining down on an isolated cow in a pasture of shadowy cows.
I like to think that the cartoon cow in the spotlight was also receiving a silent message from God traveling on the light beams. Perhaps the silent message was something on the lines of “Don’t follow the rest of the cows when they march into the pen, squeezing into a single file leading to a cattle car. That’s a one-way trip for cows.” I imagine the inspired cow trying to spread the good news to the rest of the herd, and being laughed at, like I’m sure Betty Tilley’s imaginary neighbors laughed at her personal vision.But unlike these false prophets, I have the real good news:Gardeners awake! Spring is here! Put down your knitting next to the cold ashes in the fireplace. Put on your short-sleeved t-shirt and go outside and soak up some Vitamin D. Stuff is happening in your garden, and you need to be there to see it.
(The pictures are of the Yucca Recurvifolia, Agavaceae Family. It's now in bloom across from my Veggie Garden, but don't get to close, you could lose an eye.)
