What We Plant Before It Appears — on trusting small beginnings

This morning, I carried a tray of seeds out to the garden.

Nothing impressive to look at yet. No blossoms, no vines climbing, no basket waiting to be filled. Just small packets, dark soil, and the kind of work that asks you to believe in something before it gives you proof.

I knelt beside the beds and pressed each seed into the earth more carefully than most people would think necessary.

Basil. Lemongrass. Onions. And, a row of red petunias near the edges, to make the bed flowery and beautiful.

If you have ever planted anything, you know how humbling it can be.

You place something tiny into the ground, cover it completely, and walk away with empty hands. Then you trust that what was made to grow still remembers how.

The garden keeps reminding me that small beginnings are still beginnings.

So much of life tries to convince us that only visible things matter. Results. Progress. Arrivals.

But the garden has never worked that way.

First comes the unseen work.

The shell softening.
The root reaching downward.
The patient gathering of strength beneath the surface.
The days when nothing looks different, though everything is changing.

I thought of that while watering the beds.

And I thought of you.

Perhaps there is something in your life that feels buried right now.

An idea you have not spoken aloud.
A healing that has begun but has not shown itself yet.
A new version of you that still feels too early to reveal.
A hope you nearly gave up on because it did not arrive fast enough.

Do not mistake hidden for absent.

Some things need darkness before they can grow.

Some things need time before they can be trusted.

Some things are already taking root while you stand above them wondering if you missed your chance.

I brushed the soil from my hands and looked over the beds one last time before coming inside.

Nothing had changed that I could see.

And yet, everything had begun.

If today feels small, let it still matter.

If today feels slow, let it still count.

If today feels uncertain, let it still be planted.

The earth does not worry because it cannot see the bloom yet.

Neither should you.

Warmly,
Mika
Mikasa of the Inn

P.S.
A familiar line appeared in the margin this afternoon.

“Many beautiful things look like nothing at all in their earliest stage.”
— Lady Staywell