On a warm but breezy spring morning, Norma Michael grabs the handles of her broadfork tool and stomps onto its horizontal base, plunging its spiked ends into the ground with a force that breaks up the dense soil beneath her feet.
She does this to cultivate the land as she prepares it for the rows of okra she will plant for both herself and her neighbors. The garden sits across the street from the Hinds County home where she has resided all her life.
Walking around the expansive garden, Michael points out the plethora of tomato varieties and rows of peppers she’s growing this season.
“I have a lot of tomatoes that I’m growing this year that are brand new for me–about four or five that I’ve never grown before,” she said.
‘The Lord Said To Do It’
Five years ago, as the world was in the throes of the COVID-19 pandemic, Norma Michael was sitting outside in a neighbors driveway in West Jackson’s Georgetown neighborhood. Between sips of coffee and neighborly conversation, Michael got a message from God, she said, to start a community garden…