“Tom” Got The Seeds I Sent Him !

A Picture "Tom" Made for Me.

I’ve been waiting since before Christmas to hear if “Tom” got the seeds I sent him. Tom is my sponsor child in Senegal, Africa. I sponsor him through Child Fund International, and at $24 a month, they take care of all of his needs, including education. Nearly a year ago, I wrote him a letter, and included a packet of Tomato seeds, figuring they -Might- plant them, and be more self sufficient. I also wrote in the letter that if they were useful, I could send Many, Many More.

About a month later, I got a letter back, and his family was exceptionally happy to get the seeds. They wrote “Please hurry, when sending more”. I did the only thing I really know how to do….. I got carried away. I gathered up ALL of the seeds from the farm, including anything I’ve ever even tried to grow. I filled a shoe box full of seeds, everything from Blueberry seeds, all the way through Red Lightning Tomatoes. That brick of postage was literally a farm in a box, without animals; It was everything the average gardener would need to survive on a deserted island, and then some.

I also realized that there was quite a learning curve for me to learn gardening, so I printed off some information about growing vegetables from a project in Senegal sponsored by Laura Bush.

I figured it would take a month for the seeds to arrive, and a month for their return letter, and I was quite disappointed at the end of February when there was no mention of seeds in their letters. At that point, I was sure I broke some International Postal regulation, and the seeds were thrown away.

And today, I smile from ear to ear, because at the end of their letter, it says

” The seeds may change our life and our way of planting things. God Bless You”.

If you’d like to send some seeds to “Tom”, I’d be happy to include them in my next box. Contact me at jon.macpherson@gmail.com, and I’ll give you my address.

“Tom” is not his real name, as I don’t want to endanger, or in any way harm him with my blog posts. He lives in the Capital of Senegal, Dakar. His mother is generally the one who writes to me, and she writes in French, which is translated into English by Child Fund.