Michigan residents encourage gardening amid virus outbreak

PONTIAC, Mich. (AP) — Amber Kelso, like everyone else, doesn’t want to go to the grocery store.

The 37-year-old mother of two young girls is torn. She wants her daughters to eat fresh fruit and vegetables. But her mother is sick with a heart condition and non-alcoholic liver cirrhosis, and she’s her primary caregiver.

“I have to weigh that balance on a scale. All we can think about right now is keeping her out of the hospital. Is it worth the risk?” Kelso told The Oakland Press. “If we could have access to food and not have to touch anything someone else has touched ... It’s scary to think things could go on like this.”

Kelso has always wanted to start her own vegetable garden — But between work, marriage and motherhood, she’s never had the time or the space. She’s from Kalamazoo and lived in urban areas with her husband before moving to the Westacres neighborhood of West Bloomfield.

It’s a quaint, wooded subdivision built in 1933 for low-income families. It was constructed with the intent that each homeowner would have enough land to grow crops to feed their entire family, according to the Greater West Bloomfield Historical Society.

“I always felt kind of silly living here and not having at least a few plants,” she said. “Everyone here has a garden, it’s really something different. This is my first time trying to grow food on my own. I’m pretty nervous.”

She was planning to start the garden this year, use it as a way to help her oldest daughter learn about the earth, and plants, and work on her motor skills.

There’s more urgency now to get it right. As her potted seedlings begin to sprout on the windowsill, Kelso said she hopes she can grow at least one plant.

Luckily, Kelso won’t be alone at trying her hands in the dirt....