I've grown far more of it than I need, with just about twenty plants chugging away. Ten of those are packed over-dense into a four by eight bed, so their production has been less per plant. This is only my second season growing, so I'm still figuring the whole thing out. The tallest of them now stand well over five feet, and lately I get about a quart a day from the lot of 'em.
I don't need anywhere near that much, and there's only so much bhindi masala, gumbo, and batter-fried okra folks in my household want to eat. I've already selected the healthiest plants to let run to seed stock for next year, so the question becomes: what to do with the rest?
Giving those pods to neighbors? That's a bit of a stretch in the suburban Mid-Atlantic, where okra mostly has a reputation for slime. This is, of course, utterly unfair. Okra's delicious when prepared properly, nutty and nutritious, with a satisfyingly toothsome texture. But still, folks seem confused and unfairly repulsed by it.
In most of the rest of the world, that's not the case. In the traditionally warmer regions of the planet, where most of humankind dwells, it's a staple crop. Easy to grow and productive, it's highly desired, even in its spinier forms.
Out in front of my little church, there's that Little Free Pantry, one that we started to supplement the traditional food bank in town. Folks get hungry in the off-hours, after all. It's taken off in ways we didn't anticipate. In the last six months, with the support of the church and our friends in the community, twenty seven thousand pounds of food have been funneled through a cheery little bird-feederesque box. We've set out coolers, too, and...notably...built a Little Free Produce Stand.
Because Poolesville Presbyterian sits in the heart of an agricultural reserve, there are plenty of folks who garden, and from their efforts produce an overabundance. There are, similarly, many who have more resources than they actually need for their well-being. When gardens produce more than we need, it shouldn't ever go to waste.
When there's an overabundance, the great sacred narrative of the Bible is real clear about how we are to use it. More than you need? Torah sez: don't squeeze every last drop out of the land. We are called instead to be sure to set a portion of our efforts aside for those who have need. From Leviticus 19, we hear:
When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Do not go over your vineyard a second time or pick up the grapes that have fallen. Leave them for the poor and the foreigner. I am the Lord your God.
From Deuteronomy 24, we hear:
When you are harvesting in your field and you overlook a sheaf, do not go back to get it. Leave it for the foreigner, the fatherless and the widow, so that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands. When you beat the olives from your trees, do not go over the branches a second time. Leave what remains for the foreigner, the fatherless and the widow. When you harvest the grapes in your vineyard, do not go over the vines again. Leave what remains for the foreigner, the fatherless and the widow.
And as the Law was woven by storytellers into narrative form, that becomes part of the defining mythopoetics of a culture. The Book of Ruth recounts how Ruth the Moabite and her mother Naomi...a foreigner and a widow, respectively...gleaned from the fields of the honorable Boaz. And Ruth and Boaz getting to know one another better was, as the story goes, how the lineage of King David. Without the ethic of leaving something for those who have need, there is no Israel. There is no messianic understanding. It's kinda sorta important.
And in our grasping, Mammonist age, we've forgotten this. We're encouraged to anxiously optimize, until everything we have is turned inwards, our energies like those of a collapsing star, hoarding light as it folds upon itself.
If my efforts serve me alone, if I maximize my profit at every turn and seek my own advantage without exception, then I have become an affront to the justice of God's covenant. That's a sustained and basic moral imperative, if you understand the Bible as an authoritative text in your life.
That said, there's not a whit to stop you from doing more. Gleaning can go deeper. If you expand your plantings, you can do so with the explicit intent of feeding those who hunger.
And so I knew, when I planted all that okra, that I'd have my fill, and that come harvest time, I'd be bringing bag after bag of tasty nutritious pods to the produce stand.
They're gone within the half-hour, picked up by women driving cleaning service vehicles, or men driving pickups filled with lawn equipment.
And every morning, when I snip those pods, I recall that if I expect any blessing upon the work of my hands, I need to be that blessing.
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