it was a cold night in washington, d.c., and i was heading back to the hotel when a man approached me. he asked if i would give him some money so he could get something to eat. i`d read the signs: "don`t give money to panhandlers." so i shook my head and kept walking.
i wasn`t prepared for a reply, but with resignation, he said, "i really am homeless and i really am hungry! you can come with me and watch me eat!" but i kept on walking.
the incident bothered me for the rest of the week. i had money in my pocket and it wouldn`t have killed me to hand over a buck or two even if he had been lying. on a frigid, cold night, no less, i assumed the worst of a fellow human being.
flying back to anchorage, i couldn`t help thinking of him. i tried to rationalize my failure to help by assuming government agencies, churches and charities were there to feed him. besides, you`re not supposed to give money to panhandlers.
somewhere over seattle, i started to write my weekly garden column for the anchorage daily news. out of the blue, i came up with an idea. bean`s cafe, the soup kitchen in anchorage, feeds hundreds of hungry alaskans every day. why not try to get all my readers to plant one row in their gardens dedicated to bean`s? dedicate a row and take it down to bean`s. clean and simple.
we didn`t keep records back then, but the idea began to take off. folks would fax me or call when they took something in. those who only grew flowers donated them. food for the spirit. and salve for my conscience.
in 1995, the garden writers association of america held their annual convention in anchorage and after learning of anchorage`s program, plant a row for bean`s became plant a row for the hungry. the original idea was