One morning, the first sign of the dwindling of winter was the melody of a few birds looking for threads and fluff to start nesting. It was a difficult task for these early visitors, as a solid carpet of sand covered most of the good soil and the stone streets, everywhere except in Pete’s garden.
To the regret of the earthworms that had lodged in Pete’s grounds, the early Spring in that corner of the town was softly pushing the sand and the winter away. The worms, still waking up from their long naps, no longer enjoyed the protecting shield borrowed from the desert. The arriving birds just added to their worries.
In fact, for no obvious reason, Pete’s garden was the first to be free of sand by the gentle Spring winds. While the rest of the town still looked like an extension of the near desert, the dark rich earth in his large backyard was ready, once again, to nurture forgotten seeds left from the year before. Perhaps it was because of the location of this garden.
It did not take long for small yellow-green patches to shine behind his hut with minute vegetation, timidly growing in different spots. Those walking by thought that the tiny plants had grown in a matter of hours. The truth, however, was that it had taken several days for the seeds left from the last fall to germinate, until one warmer day they had shown their splendour.
The neighbours did not ignore this early start. For most, in fact, it appeared to be too much of a coincidence. It had happened every year since Pete first opened the sandy earth to plant a garden. Back then, everybody saw his efforts as a newcomer’s mistake. Nobody who had resided in the town for a full seasonal cycle had attempted to cultivate gardens so close to the desert and in such a sandy terrain.
When Pete started, his tenacity in impregnating the land quickly became a topic of conversation and, at times, of ridicule. Everybody’s yard was witness to the futility of such efforts, or so they thought, given that their yards had no signs of life and were in a constant struggled to get rid of the sand.
At the end of that first season, however, astonishment had given place first to silence and then to envy. The flowers, vegetables and fruits in Pete’s new garden were the largest, most fragrant and colourful that people had ever seen around.
“He is privileged to have the garden in a corner protected from the elements,” commented the most tolerant.
“It is probably powers he hides from everybody,” someone else whispered, and so this went on and on.
∞
