Gardens of the Soul by Ferrin Crosby

Growing up in a small town like St. Johns has many advantages that some from the city may not initially be aware of. As a youth growing up in St. Johns, I worked for myself from the time I was 8 or 9 years old. I was privileged to have an old red Farmall tractor that I used to plow people’s gardens. By the time I was in my teens I knew everyone in town, or at least everyone who had a garden. Each fall I would make a circuit plowing remnants of gardens under for the winter, and each spring I would prepare the same gardens for planting. This experience early in my life taught me these great life lessons:

1.     In order to have a successful crop, you must first prepare the soil - In my life I have found that preparation is 95% of any accomplishment. As a wrestler and then as a coach I have watched many young men prepare for competition with the goal of overcoming an opponent and winning the prize. These young men prepared with extreme effort, knowing that if they trained harder than their competitor, they deserved to win. This kind of preparation instills the attitude of never giving up and never quitting.

2.     I learned that in order to plow gardens I had to keep my tractor in good operational condition (My Dad was extremely helpful to me) – My Dad taught me how to pay attention to a machine, how to check the oil, gas, and coolant levels. He taught me how to listen to the engine, to feel and to hear what a smoothly running engine felt and sounded like compared to one that was in need of repair. These lessons have been immeasurable in value to me in my life. Aside from saving money on simple mechanical repair, I have been able to understand when one of our vehicles was in need of attention before a major problem occurred. I learned that not unlike machines, people I love also have need of listening and understanding when they are out of sorts and need attention. Most, if not all, of these repairs in people come through simply helping them understand who they are. They are children of a loving Heavenly Father.

3.     During all my trips to every part of town, I learned that there are good people everywhere. No matter what religion, ethnicity, or background, people can have and do have a propensity to be good. I so enjoy my memories of these people and am amazed that they put their confidence in me to plow their gardens and not run over their fruit trees. People like Ernie Wilbur, Arlo Lee, Matt Montoya, and LP Sherwood, to name just a few. – This experience has helped me to try to see the good in people. Doing so has been a catalyst to me for making good friends from a wide variety of backgrounds. It has also helped me see the vast amount of service our community renders to one another and encourages me to do my part.

4.     Lastly, I discovered that growing a garden is hard work; plowing it and preparing it for seed is just the beginning. Many weeks thereafter of watering, weeding, fertilizing, and cultivating are necessary in order to harvest the desired crop. – I learned life is just like this; mostly we are preparing ourselves for the next season. A wise prophet said “This life is the time for men to prepare to meet God, this life is the day for men to perform their labors.” I found that, like a well-tended garden, when life serves up weeds such as hate, envy, or greed, we need to pluck them out. When our ground (hearts) gets too hard to allow the water and fertilizer in to nourish us, the Master Gardener will use trials, temptations, and sorrow to soften us up. And, as with our gardens, if we exercise faith, a good crop will grow out of the experience.

This is a much prettier tractor than the one I drove,
but this is how I remember it.