October arrived and with it the first frosts of the season. The weather report warned of an impending freeze so I went out before work for the last harvest. The plants were so heavy with green tomatoes, they were literally leaning over. And that was despite my wife picking a bowl full the day before. It seemed a shame to harvest them before they vine ripened red. The previous year, we followed some farmer wisdom and put the green tomatoes in a paper bag to ripen in a dark cool area of the basement. It wasn’t such a good idea because we forgot, and found the tomatoes rotted in a paper bag, in a dark cool area of the basement, sometime in February.
Still, I regretted the season wasn’t longer. Regret of course, is something to be avoided, so I put that out of my mind. Certainly in life and the world these days, there’s more to fret about than green tomatoes.
In the ensuing month, the presidential election, war in Syria and other worries made me forget about the tomatoes.
Then Thanksgiving arrived. I was considering all I had to give thanks for when I noticed a tray full of beautiful red-ripe tomatoes where the green tomatoes used to be. Without my worrying about it, the tomatoes turned out fine. And just in time for Turkey-Day dinner.
And that’s usually how things turn out, for which I should always give Thanksgiving.
copyright 2016 Christopher Donahue