We have a greenhouse that is full up with tomatoes. You walk in to a chandelier of leaves. But it’s the smell you notice first. A very specific tomato-ey smell that is not just tomatoes themselves, but a combination of soil and water and vegetal freshness that’s enlivening and luscious.
I heard a philosopher & psychiatrist speak once about our feelings. He said that there were many feelings we experience that don’t have names because they’re so specific to a moment, a situation, a relationship. They’re completely their own thing. Particular and un-nameable. A little bit mysterious. This smell is something like that. The greenhouse is completely her own universe.
The last few days I’ve been home all by myself and I’ve had jobs to do that aren’t usually on my list. Watering the tomatoes has been one of them. I water and chat and listen as liquid meets earth and the soil wakes up and the plants titter amongst themselves and drink and are delighted.
And I balance on one leg and reach for the cherry baubles that roll off under my thumb, and they explode with a goodness that only fresh tomatoes can in the euphoria of completing their earthly mission.
It’s feels so satisfying and right and comforting somehow to grow and tend and eat in a way where each bite is understood as a tiny miracle. Subversive somehow.
A revolution inside of a tomato.
As you may have guessed, tomatoes are my #8 Small Happiness.