Home-Grown Tomatoes and the Good Life

There’s a song I introduced to the family this summer called Home-Grown Tomatoes. Guy Clark wrote it, and it’s been recorded a few different ways, but the line that always sticks with me is: “Only two things that money can't buy: that's true love and home-grown tomatoes.” I think he was onto something.

We don’t always have a great garden. Some years the weeds win. Some years we don’t even get started. But this year, we’re winning. Earlier this spring, we built a few raised beds out of cedar pickets in the backyard and dumped in some good soil. Then I stepped back and watched something special happen.

I haven’t lifted a finger since—not for planting, not for watering, not for weeding, and not for harvesting. Lena and the girls have taken it over entirely. I just get to enjoy the spoils. Every time I slice into one of those perfectly red tomatoes, I remember what a gift it is to have a garden—not just for the produce, but for the joy and work it brings the people you love.

The girls have taken to singing that tomato song as they tend to the garden, and I catch myself humming it too. They’re discovering all the ways you can enjoy a tomato. We’ve had them with eggs. We might try them with gravy. We haven’t tested the beans yet—pinto or navy—but I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s next.

As red and plentiful as our tomatoes have been, our little backyard bounty is nothing compared to what my father-in-law, Terry Larkins, is pulling out of his garden. Their kitchen looks like a tomato packing facility. The counters are covered, the table’s full, and you can’t set a glass down without bumping into a bowl of red.

My twelve-year-old, Emmalyn, told me that when she hears Home-Grown Tomatoes, she pictures Mimi moving around the kitchen like a blur, canning as fast as she can, and Poppi coming in the back door with another couple of buckets like he’s trying to break a record. It’s a beautiful picture—and a pretty accurate one.

It’s easy to get wrapped up in everything that’s wrong in the world. But sometimes, you’ve got to remember what’s right. A garden that grows. A family that works together. The smell of tomato leaves in the summer sun. And a song that makes you smile.

You may not be able to buy true love or home-grown tomatoes. But if you’re lucky, someone in your family is growing both.

“You can go out and eat ’em, that’s for sure,

But there’s nothin’ a home-grown tomato won’t cure.

You can eat ’em with eggs, you can eat ’em with gravy,

You can eat ’em with beans, pinto or navy…”

—Guy Clark, Home Grown Tomatoes