The Gardener (Part 1 of 3)

Baking with apples from Gram and Grandad's apple tree.

PRAYERS ANSWERED
We are in Ohio! We had a great time in California and all the times we shared people were very gracious and encouraging. Our travels to the Midwest went smoothly and the kids did well. We have heard from our friends on the islands that our teammates and kids have all arrived back safely.

Using the fun apple peeler. (We don't get apples on the islands!)

PRAYERS REQUESTED

Continue to pray for the transition of all our (former) teammates as they settle back into life on the islands and as they prepare things for new team members that will arrive at the beginning of the year. We will be sharing several times at church tomorrow and throughout the week-- continue to pray that we would say what He would have us share. At the end of next week we travel to Missouri, again please pray that our two little kids do well on the planes.

This is a fictional short story written on the islands and inspired by the islands. As a team we were all challenged to look into something new and do some kind of project-- this short story was the result of that assignment. 

THE GARDENER

by Megan

PART ONE

    I awoke much earlier than normal. My parents were still asleep and it was still light outside. I tried to stay in bed, but my restlessness would not be calmed. So I quietly got out of bed and went outside. I was careful to stay in the shadows and finding a dark spot under a tree I sat down, willing the light to fade away faster.

    As the shadows lengthened, people started coming out from their homes, which were nestled among the roots of the various trees. This was a great time of day for adults to get work done. The light was low enough that it was easy to stay in the shadows but you could still see without lighting fires. Some daring men even chose to go gathering at this time—they said it was the ideal time to get the best fruit. But most people thought this type of gathering was foolish. Suppose they attracted the Gardener’s notice and were seen in the light. I was still young and hadn’t been fully educated but I did know the basics—stay in the darkness, flee from the light and above all, fear the Gardener.

    All children know these basics, but today my real education was to begin. Today was the day my age group would be allowed to go gathering with the men. They weren’t going to risk any light for our first gathering so I knew I had a long time to wait before we would leave. So I just sat and watched the Community beginning to mill about. A few people spotted me under my chosen tree. One man smiled knowingly, seeming to remember the excitement of becoming an adult, a full and contributing member of the Community.

    My mother’s voice broke me from my reverie, “If you’re up, might as well help me and go get some water.”

    I was happy to have a task to take my mind off waiting. I grabbed the bucket from her outstretched hand.

    “Get as far up as you can without going in the light,” she said as I walked away.

    “I know, I know,” I called back at her.

    The shadows had just reached the stream. I stooped down to fill the bucket with the murky water. Further up the water ran strong and clear but that was in the Garden. That water was almost always in the light and anywhere in the Garden was dangerous.

    I looked out at the Garden. The plants were tall and full. They seemed to go on forever.

    It was getting darker so I hurried to take the bucket back to my mother while I could still see well enough not to trip.

    When I got back to our house, the first fires were being lit out in the open and my mother let me have some of the early batch of food to eat with my father. I was so full of energy that I was bouncing in my seat as we ate.

    “Calm down,” my father scolded. “If you are too excited, you’re going to make a mistake.”

    I did my best to stop my outward movements. My father went back into his room and I returned to my waiting spot outside.

    I saw my father emerge from the house dressed in his gathering clothes. Immediately I popped out of my seat ready to follow. He paused at my mother.

    “Stay safe, both of you,” she said looking at both of us.

    “If it pleases the Gardener,” was my father’s routine reply. He turned to leave. I gave my mom a quick smile and followed closely behind him.

    Men were meeting at the Community fire, which was just beginning to flame. I quickly found the boys my age huddled in a group and sharing stories. 

    “I heard that one time,” started a boy,  “this guy was really cocky, sticking his hand in the light and pretending like he wasn’t scared of the Gardener. So the Community tied him out in the light during the day without a shirt on and the Gardener almost burned him to death. He was screaming and when they brought him back, his skin was bright red and hot to touch.”

    “My dad,” began another, “said that if you want proof that the light is dangerous all you have to do is hold your hand in it for a little while and not draw it back and you will start to feel it burn.”

    “I heard that if a little light touches even your clothes while you’re in the garden then the Gardener will see you and crush you--- that’s why people sometimes come back from gathering hurt or even... dead.”

    The boy ended the statement with a slight tremor in his voice. We were quiet thinking about it when suddenly our thoughts were interrupted by a loud voice.

    “Hey you lot! Come over here and get in line!” said the commanding voice.

    We quickly obeyed. 

    “So you think you know something about the light or the Gardener.” The elder walked down the line of us, shouting in our faces as he went. “You’ve heard a few stories, so now you whisper together like little experts comparing notes.”

    He took a step back from us and the rest of the Community created an informal circle around the scene.

    He continued. “So let’s see.... you boy,” he said pointing to a boy two to my right, “where does our food come from?”

    “Uh...the garden?” the boy said softly.

    “And who is responsible for the Garden?” the elder continued.

    There was silence; no one wanted to say something wrong.

    “Who made the fruit? Who owns the garden?...This is basic, boys,” he said impatiently.

   He held out his hand for the answer and several of us said together, “The Gardener.”

     “Thanks be to the Gardener,” answered several of the men standing nearby.

    The elder continued addressing us as before. “Now some of you boys are scared, and so you should be. We cannot survive without the Gardener. We know it and he knows it. Do you think he doesn’t know what happens in his own garden? Do you think he doesn’t know we come and gather food every night? The Gardener knows everything and he could crush us all if he wanted to. He could take our food away or just kill us outright. Our one hope is to not attract his undue notice and to not upset him. Above all we must not upset the Gardener!”

    “So we do what we can to follow his rules, to not fall into traps and to not draw his attention or his wrath. Because if we don’t,” he paused and looked at all of us, “his wrath would be unbearable.”

    As the elder finished this opening talk, I began to wish I were back home helping my mother—doing things I was comfortable with and confident at. My mind began to wander and contemplate all we had just heard, when I realized we were being told how to prepare for gathering. I chided myself and tried quickly to figure out what was going on.

    There were rules for how to wash and dress to get ready. Different men had taken small groups of boys from the line. “The Gardener is meticulous. You’ll notice how organized the garden is. If you do one thing wrong, you could draw his notice. So follow us carefully.” I anxiously watched and imitated his movements. All the men were doing it, like some long-practiced dance.

    I was so scared of making some stupid mistake. I imagined myself walking into the garden with a relative bulls-eye on my chest and the Gardener striking me dead before I was there a minute. I was relieved when we didn’t actually go in the Garden that night. We stood on the edge, closer than I had ever been, but still not in danger.  We could just make out the men as they went about the garden in the darkness, gathering the food for the Community.

    When they were done they brought the food back to the Community and the women took it to be prepared and the men sat in a circle around the fire to discuss.

    For years I had watched the men come back and sit in this circle. Tonight we were allowed to join them, but now that I was here and my education had begun, I suddenly felt very small. I hadn’t even gathered any fruit or even gone in the Garden. Everything suddenly felt too big for me. Who was I to think that the Gardener would allow me to pick fruit from his garden? I chose my seat on the ground and held my knees to my chest trying to make myself look as small and insignificant as I felt.

    I looked around and most of the other boys took similar positions. The men started to talk. Their faces glowed in the firelight. They talked about the Community, the Gardener and gathering. As they talked I felt myself calm a little—at least I had the Community. I was not alone. The Garden may be scary but at least I had this home to come back to. We were in this together. We were the Community.

********************

    As the days passed the elders repeated the same talk and instructions to us each nightfall. Each evening we were quizzed and tested on our knowledge. We soon learned to fear the swift swat that accompanied any incorrect answer. But as time went on, the swats came less often even as the instructions became fuller and more complex.

    We learned how to best stay in the nighttime shadows because even the pale light of the night could reveal us. We learned how to feel and find the fruit in complete darkness. We learned to stay to the outskirts of the garden because no matter how tempting fruit further in may seem, toward the center of the garden lived the Gardener himself.

    The fruit we often gathered was small or bruised or otherwise damaged but we learned to accept all with thankfulness—this is what the Gardener had allotted to us. 

    After more than a month we were individually tested in all the knowledge and rituals. The whole Community was there—even the women were close enough to listen. After the elders nodded their approval our various mothers came forward and handed us a stack of clothes, proper gathering clothes. They were made tough with extra material at the knees for the kneeling plus a pair of fingerless gloves for picking. The other boys and I looked at each other with excited glances as we changed into our new clothes. We looked like men. We were men. We could provide for the Community and even speak at the nightly fire.

     I caught my father’s eye and he gave me a half smile and a nod.

    From then on we were allowed to go out with less direct supervision. We still gathered with the main group of men and had to stay in eyesight of everyone else, but we could gather on our own. So life became a routine: wake, gather, sit by the fire and sleep. The life of a man.

    One night as we gathered, I was lying on the ground with my hand just coming around a piece of fruit, careful to stay in the shadow. I was concentrating hard on not getting tangled in the plant when I saw the pale light shining on a strange object a few plants away. I let go of the fruit and stood up. I slowly moved toward the object. The plants opened up and revealed what seemed to be a path. The light was shining on a sign. Written in big letters it said,

COME FURTHER IN!
THE FRUIT IS BETTER &
THE GARDENER
WANTS TO KNOW YOU.
WELCOME!

    As I read I slowly moved forward, closer to the sign until I was in the middle of the path. I didn’t know it was happening until a hand pulled me back violently by the shoulder. He was a young man, though still much older than myself. He was shaking his head, obviously upset and flustered.

    “What are you doing?? Are you an idiot?? ," he yelled at me in a loud whisper.

     “But what does it mean?” I asked, bewildered and confused.

    “Be quiet!” he answered quickly. “Come with me.”

    He pushed me in front of him all the way back to the Community fire. Then he half threw me in the middle of the circle.

    “I found him in the middle of a path, reading a sign!” he declared to the group. 

    I heard the sounds of shock and disapproval all around me. I quickly lowered my head in shame. I tried to find my father’s face for reassurance but when my eyes found him he wouldn’t look at me.

    Suddenly one of the Community elders silenced the group by pounding a stick on the ground. He addressed me, “How could you do such a thing?! You have endangered the whole Community.” 

    My head dropped farther and I tried hard to stop myself from crying. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know...,” I began to say. Suddenly some of the older young men came inside the circle and started smacking me on the head. I fell to the ground. One of them kicked me but then they backed away. The elders had decided that was enough.

    I crawled quickly to a darkened spot in the circle and tried to stifle my tears. An elder walked out until everyone could see him in the firelight.

    “Obviously, we haven’t done enough to educate you young ones,” he began,  “because it seems that even the simplest of traps can fool you into endangering us all.”  He paused and looked around the circle.

    “The Gardener may allow us to have what we need from his garden but he is waiting for us to overstep our bounds. He is waiting for us to make a mistake. He is waiting to crush us and thereby prove that he has all power over us.”

    He paced around the middle of the circle looking this way and that. Older men nodded in agreement. He continued, “The Gardener has placed temptations...tests...traps. Sometimes it is a wider path that could allow us to travel faster; sometimes it is a basket of pre-picked fruit. Sometimes it is a sign telling us lies.” He stopped his walking and looked over in my direction, “This is the bait of fools and will only lead to their destruction and perhaps to the destruction of us all.”

    As he stopped talking he looked at me. His gaze stayed on me with such intensity that all I wanted was to disappear into the dust. Finally he looked away and addressed the crowd again.

    “I think we have given the young ones a little too much freedom. Let’s keep them on the edge for a few more weeks until they have learned this lesson well.”

    For a week, none of my age group would talk to me. Even my father was cool. But slowly things got better. Some curious boys even asked what I had seen. Then people seemed to forget my disgrace. Still I didn’t forget that feeling—that shame. I knew then it was better to not be known or noticed by anyone—not the Gardener and not the Community.

*********** END of PART ONE (1 of 3)