June 7th, 2006: First Harvest

Yesterday at 8 AM all of my little tomatoes were still green. At 1 PM, lo and behold, one had turned red! Good job, little tomato!

I imagine I will celebrate the first four or five that I harvest, and after that will gather them as they come along, without much further ado.

Funny how that works. Like how a first child's first everything is noted, and subsequent children have just general notice taken. Like the day they first walked or cut a tooth. I remember exactly when my first born Laura first sat alone, crawled and talked. As to second born Jeff, all I can say is he did sit up alone, crawled and began to talk, all well within the frame work of normal developmental milestone timetables.

The paper today has a full section on growing tomatoes in Houston. The news isn't good. Tomato season is limited to from between late May and mid-June, due to heat factors which limit pollination. Stink bugs here have super powers for crop destruction. My poor little volunteer tomato...clearly it grew from a seed on the lam. Thought it could sneak itself into an atypical garden of bonsai and japanese maples, there by eluding the dreaded Houston Tomato Bogie Bugs.

I'm going to relish each and every tomato. I might not remember each of them personally, but collectively, they will be memorialized. Maybe that is why I have only two kids. I just don't have the "Parent Power" needed to rejoice and recall events related to more than two.

And to think that there is one Father who actually is able to keep track of every tear, every hair that falls, and plans and knows, and remembers, each and every day of each of His children's lives. Amazing!