I am a city girl. Not my choice. But I am. I was born and brought up in a city and have lived all my life in cities. However, my parents who were born in quaint little villages in God’s own country, made sure that I enjoyed a slice of the countryside all my life. Especially my mom, who made sure that I had plants and animals in my life. Though she was the one who would always end up caring for the dogs and cats that I enjoyed having in my life.
Most of our lives we lived in independent houses with a bit of earth for my mom to grow her kitchen garden. It is only in recent times that we have been living in an apartment. Something my mother hates. I do too, but it is more convenient for a working woman.
However, even today, she ensures that I get my slice of the country side –albeit in little plastic buckets, and tin cans and clay pots.
In our 2’ by 2’ balcony a tiny bit of space is devoted to my mother’s now highly shrunk kitchen garden. She manages to grow all kinds of vegetables there –tomatoes, potatoes, chillies, different kinds of beans, cucumber etc
There’s always a difference between these vegetables and the store bought ones. The one from my balcony seems more pure and healthy, sweet and lovely. I enjoy them tremendously. More than eating them, I feel wonderful when I see these vegetables hanging in my mom’s bucket-sized-kitchen-garden.
It not only reminds me but also reiterates the fact that we actually need very little to live on and we can always have all that we need and we can have it well. It is possible. That’s what this little, sweet looking vegetable from my teeny-tiny garden tells me.
And it gives me my slice of the country side -my slice of heaven
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