“Weeds” for Supper

At the age of fifteen, I lived alone and worked for a bakery down the street. At the end of the day, I’d bring home loaves — bricks, really — of day-old multigrain bread that I’d gratefully eat by the slice with a tall glass of water, filling my belly. Adulting had dropped into my lap and largely, I welcomed it.

Since then, I’ve expanded my awareness of connection with all beings and in doing so have discovered the joyful abundance of giving and receiving with plants around me. Tracing my personal history of learning about interconnection now, tears fall.

In the garden of plants that I consciously cultivate, there are some beings that drop by unexpectedly as a rule. Purselane is one I’ve guided into an edible, creeping ground cover for the paths between beds. She is always welcome and gets transplanted to where I appreciate her most. In spring, I pick cleavers, or rather it “chooses” me with a velcro grip, and I distill it in cool filtered water to consume as a tonic.

Most recently, I’ve had the honor of meeting purple dead nettle more fully at my kitchen table. Along with wild mustards that spring from the soft earth around me in March, clouds of dead nettle bloom with a soft purple hue that settles over our entire garden. For years, I have plucked these plants gently and laid them on the beds from which they grew, a cover crop of their own seeding. The nutrients they draw up from the earth then rest at the surface of the soil as they transition and transform.

But this year, I held dead nettle in my hands and wondered why she hadn’t joined me in the kitchen as well, to nourish me and my family directly. I did a little research to check my hunch, and sure enough, purple dead nettle is full of nutrients for human people too!

As I harvested my self-seeded domestic mustard (hallelujah!) from the back of our lot, I also collected delicate wild mustards and purple dead nettle with care. I trimmed and ground these wild kin into pesto for our family dinner and lunch with friends.

I feel so gratefully connected to and supported by the plants and animals around me. At fifteen, I relished the opportunity to put my own world view to the test. Experiencing few “outer resources,” I opened myself to connect with an inner wisdom that we are all One, that care surrounds me with abundance. I set out into the world then with this trust.

It is with deepest reverence that I hold in my hands daily the evidence of such care. Dead nettle, thank you. I am filled with your love, body and soul.