Gardening forces me to acknowledge that rootedness is about specific conditions – not perfect ones. When God wrote the first draft of his kingdom, a set of rules for the nation of Israel, he underscored his tenth and final warning, “do not covet,” seven times: “you shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”

I try not to covet my neighbor’s tomato plot.