It’s Hard, Then It’s Beautiful

We bought an acre and a half in Hood River with a dream to grow our family there and raise food. When we first saw what later became our land, it looked good with the naked eye: flat pasture with a Mt Adams view, irrigation nearby, a pond that was home to red wing black birds, frogs, and ducks. There was such promise. My husband and I knew exactly where we would put the fruit trees and begin planting the food forest.

After the busyness and stress of moving finally subsided, the time came for me to dig our first hole with the intent of planting some perennial flowers. I used my booted foot to push the shovel into the ground. I pulled out what should have been a shovel full of pure dirt but instead I noticed a rusy old can lid, a few rusty old springs, and a dirty old sock in the large scoop of dirt. Curious, I began to dig more and with every shovel full more garbage was exposed.

We learned that the previous owners of the property did not drive to the transfer station located only 3 miles away to dispose of their garbage. Instead, for many consecutive years, they used the land as their personal dump station. After dumping trash bags full of garbage, couches, lawn mowers, clothes, swingsets, tires, gas cans, barbed wire, alcohol bottles, and drug paraphernalia on the property, at some point they covered it with added dirt, boulders, rocks, and huge tree stumps.

We could have left it. Unless you dug down into the soil, no one would know it was there. The ugly was buried. We could have attempted to plant new life in the garbage infested soil. The soil was not only contaminated with oil and gasoline from old lawnmowers and other small engines buried, it had little if any life. It was dead soil.

In order to plant new life, we had to dig out the old.

And we did. We removed twenty four truck loads of garbage. I remember digging shovel fulls of garbage feeling so overwhelmed. When will I get it all out? Is this even possible? I would fill up the truck bed for the fifth, sixth, and seventh time and sit back looking at all the trash and wanting to cry. I was so tempted to cover the garbage site, plant anyway and hope for the best. In my heart, I knew the plants would not thrive. I cannot plant new life in trash and expect a harvest. So my husband and I dug… and dug… and dug. With an aching back and sore hands, I suddenly realized: this is me. This is my story.

Hurts, trauma, and loss buried anxiety, fear, dread, shame, lies, anger, and pride deep inside of me. I looked decent on the outside but the inside was filled with emotional garbage that was robbing me of life to the full. I needed to do the hard work of unburying it, pull it out, and replace it with truth, love, grace, empathy, and comfort. As I worked my land, I bonded with it. This was no longer just a future garden site, this was my story, my heart, my life. I was determined to heal this land, to heal within myself.

The day finally came when I was able to dig a hole and only dirt was on my shovel, without any remnants of trash.

Three years later, where there once was garbage buried deep into the earth, now grew a flourishing, beautiful food forest boasting of flowers, fruit, vegetables, herbs, and trees. When I dug into the food forest floor, the soil was now rich and dark filled with billions of life supporting microbes.

Occassionally, after a hard rain, when I planted a new plant in the food forest, a little piece of garbage would come to the surface. I would simply remove it, add nutrient rich compost, and put in a life supporting plant.

Remnants of my own emotional garbage pushes to the surface with stress or pressure. I don’t rebury it. I see it. I acknowledge it. I grieve it. Then I remove it and plant life: Who I am. Who God is. How much I mean to Him. And I live.