Last summer we visited our daughter and son-in-law in Dayton, Ohio.
While there, we stood on their patio and feasted on the best tomatoes any of us had ever tasted. I vowed I would grow Sweet Million Cherry tomatoes this year. I finally found them on Amazon but by the tome they came my garden only had room for two, so I planted the other two in pots and sent them on the walk surrounding our patio.
I like to water potted plants until the water flows out the bottom of the pot and became worried that these new pots did not have a drainage hole because no matter how much water I added the walk stayed dry. I could not image that I had not noted a drain when I filled the pots and a visit to Home Depot proved to me the pots had drain holes.
The patio plants grew faster than those in the garden, probably because the sol warmed faster. Soon they were loaded with tomatoes but the leaves were not a healthy green like their garden brothers. I added more fertilizer, moved them so they received even more sun light but they continued to look sick. I mentioned this to our daughter and she asked if the pots had drainage holes. “Of course!” I replied with some indignation.
Good news, last week three of the tomatoes began to turn orange and Monday evening they were red. Mary and I planned on sampling them last night.
What follows good news? Bad news. When I came home from work yesterday I really ran out the back door with my mouth watering like one of Pavlov’s dogs. But there were no red tomatoes on either plant! Matter of fact, there were hardly any green tomatoes either! There were a couple of clusters on the ground and some of the leaves were torn off. The deer had had our feast. They also got the ripe ones from the garden, as well as the cucumber vines! My poor heart was sick!
We carried the pots up the four steps of the deck and hope that gate will keep our “should be dinner” pests away. But, as day follows night, good often follows bad. While lifting the pots the saucers came off spewing out Niagara Falls. They were tightly adhered to the bottom of the pot making a water proof seal. Already today the leaves are greener, and the remaining fruit looks healthier. Can’t wait till can enjoy these great little tomatoes.
This story reminds me about parenting and the lesson I learned is a good one. No matter how knowledgeable we are or how much we plan, things can go wrong. The trick to good parenting and good gardening is to concentrate on the thing that go right. Don’t let yourself get hung up on failure but try to see the good that can grow out of it. If the deer had not eaten those tomatoes we would not know about the water sealed in the saucer and soon the beautiful plants with their sweet tomatoes would die.
Life’s like that; so is love. Some say love is blind, I say love concentrates on the good rather than the bad. We don’t have to be Pollyannas, but life is a lot better, happier, and more fun if we concentrate on the good things and look for lessons in the things that go wrong.