It may seem trivial, but trust me it is huge.

Somewhere down the line I had heard something. It was in my past, a voice from a cooking show perhaps, or at a friend’s house while preparing for dinner. I was young and it stuck.  “Never cut the asparagus, gently snap them so it breaks in the right spot; perfect ripeness on one side, over ripe or woody on the other.”
I traveled through much of my life making it an appropriate ritual. I relied on the asparagus to show me what was good and what was bad. I used the good parts and the rest went into the trash without much thought.

Because I consider myself a new green citizen of the 21st century, I am analyzing the details of my life to detect areas to improve upon.  I have been reading, learning and adapting.

One evening last fall, I was making roasted vegetable pasta for dinner.  I washed all the vegetables and began to snap the asparagus.  A rush of emotion passed through my heart and sent unique information to my brain.  I thought, “That seems like a lot of asparagus going to waste.”  Though not really a trait I would ever use to describe myself, there I was being wasteful for only me to see. Private wastefulness is the worst to conquer, but I did. I decided that I know more than the asparagus so I got out the knife to gently cut it into a variety of pieces.

Two things had caused this realization – we had started composting and a friend had shown me how to make a green smoothie.  So, part of the asparagus we ate (the best part of course being the tip) another part I set aside for the next day’s green smoothie, and the last little tiny part went into the compost bin, where soon, by making rich soil to grow lettuce with, we would eat it again.

My point is, there are habits that still need to be broken. I stopped breaking the asparagus. Every small step counts in the big picture.
Painting: “Asparagus on my path”