I received three seed catalogs in the mail just days after Christmas. Seed companies know what they are doing riding the coattails of the season. Still fresh in our memories are the faces of children with their toys under the tree. They are planting in our heads the seeds of dreams.
Seed catalogs have rooted themselves into the furrow plowed by the dream catalog of childhood:The Sears Roebuck Christmas Catalog. Unlike Clement Moore, of sugar plums we never dreamed. We dreamed of toys. Toy in the Sears Wish Book. We revered that dream filled catalog like a sacred magical book. Every page was fingered hundreds, maybe, thousands of times before our eyes closed the night before Christmas. The pages were dogeared. The photographs circled. They were by our sides until we dropped off to sleep.
Of all the toys we chose, our families purchased just a few. If any. This time around we are the ones making the purchases. We can purchase as many seed packets as we can afford. Seeds that may never see the light of day, breathe fresh air or feel warm damp soil. For it is not the flowers and vegetables that are being sold. Seeds, desires and dreams of flowers and vegetables are what these catalogs are selling.
As before, I'll carry these catalogs with me to work. I will take them to the toilet. I will take them to bed. Soon, it will be time to decide which seeds to order from circled photographs on those dogeared pages. Then stacks of seed packets will spill across my kitchen table. Packets containing potential flowers and vegetables that may grow in my garden. Maybe, they will just remain beautiful seeds of dreams.
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