Many times, my friends who read this blog (love you love you love you) will mention that I’ve posted something to which they can really relate. Many moms I know go through some of the same struggles I go through, and when I can write about them I feel better, and when fellow moms can laugh about them they feel better. Win/win.
But today, I’m going to tell you something you can’t possibly understand. It’s just too stupid. But it’s a big deal to me.
Ready?
I can’t grow tomatoes.
Literally. I have tried to grow tomatoes for six years and have never actually consumed anything more than a single cherry tomato in an entire season.
The problems are simple but seemingly insurmountable: shady yard. Hungry squirrels.
My neighbor planted a huge tomato garden that was wildly successful, and I think she did it just to taunt me. She probably doesn’t even like tomatoes. She probably shot the squirrels.
One would think that a logical, educated woman would say, “Okay, I’ll grow something else.”
Not me.
No. I am now on a mission.
FOR SIX YEARS I’ve tried to overcome the shady yard AND the hungry squirrels. The squirrels I can outsmart, thank God. The shady yard’s got me beat. I even had my trees aggressively trimmed just so I could grow a tomato, but it wasn’t enough. I should just admit defeat.
But sometimes I am like a stubborn, irrational tick on a dog. And I’m afraid my self-worth has gotten wrapped up in this. “Tomatoes are easier to grow than weeds!” announced one website. “So simple, a child can grow a bountiful crop!” Yeah, well, bite me.
So I have a two-pronged attack this year. One, Jack gave me a Topsy Turvy Tomato Planter for Mother’s Day. (Caroline gave me a cookie bouquet. Who loves me more, I ask?) That contraption is in the back yard, in the square foot of sunshine I get in the middle of my patio, in the morning.
And then…I have just returned from Home Depot, where I bought a gigantic raised planting bed and 5,000 cubic feet of soil. That sucker is going right on my driveway, even if it makes me look like a redneck. I don’t care. It's a sunny driveway, and sun is what I need.
I WILL grow one single stupid large edible tomato this year.
And I will eat it.
And then I will have won.
And next year I can try cucumbers.
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