About a month ago, I gave in. I bought a tomato plant. A 50 cent scrawny foot tall with nine leaves tomato plant.
For a year and a half I lived in this one bedroom apartment in the middle of a busy and growing city. Over that time I have slowly come to miss the country, even to the point of missing 'the garden'.
We speak of the garden as if it were a living entity, an animal, lurking in the back yard.
'Have you watered The Garden?'
'The Garden is looking sickly.'
'Time to go weed The Garden.'
In my childhood the presence of The Garden meant time in the sun picking off hornworms and turning stinky chicken poop into less stinky compost. Garden meant work, and lots of it. The only reason I ever thought I would own a tomato plant would be out of a sense of duty to supply my family with cheap healthy food.
However, not long after moving to this concrete jungle, I began to develop what Jenna calls Barnheart. I believe I am terminally infected, but that's alright, life is terminal anyway. I also hope I'm contagious.
It began with missing the trees, the stars, the crickets, and the smell of animals and hay. It quickly progressed to a longing to be doing something outside, which turned into a desire to be doing something productive outside. When I transplanted to the city I was stunned by how little there was to do outside that was productive. There were no eggs to gather, no chicken, horses, cows, or rabbits to take care of, no lawn to mow, no hay to move, no feed to haul, and no ice to break. I went out of my way to walk in grass on my way to the mailbox.
I stopped to look at every plant on my way into the grocery store and mourn over the poor ones that were overgrowing their little containers. I come by this honestly, my mother does the same thing. She even has a 'hospital bed' in her garden for nursing plants back to health. Finally Luke told me to get one.
I was hesitant, but some of our other neighbors have started putting their plants on the concrete pads in the back that we all share but no one uses, so I decided on a scrawny little thing with no tag. It looked the healthiest, and didn't look like a cherry tomato. There was an heirloom tomato tag that looked like it might have fallen from his pot, so I picked it up and stuck it back in the pot, claiming this little container of dirt and vegetation for my own.
Luke bought me potting soil and a pot and I planted the little sucker deep in the soil, leaving only the 3-4 inches that had leaves exposed. Tomatoes will sprout roots all along the buried stem and I wanted to give this little one an opportunity to make up for his cramped beginning.
It's been a month now, and my tomato has blight, but it's been kept under control by keeping the plant healthy and plucking off the affected leaves as soon as I notice them.
It also has its first fruit.
I am so excited.
I can't wait to make homemade salsa and have fresh tomato on my sandwiches.
This is just a temporary treatment for Barnheart though. I'm already thinking of how we could keep meat rabbits or laying hens.
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