I'm not a green thumb or someone I'd consider to be a gardener.  I do like to have a couple of tomato plants each year.  I put them in pots instead of in the ground to avoid the late and early frosts here in Western PA.  My goal is fresh tomatoes for my salads or to mix with mozzarella and fresh basil (the only other thing I try to grow most every year).  I admit it, I also love the smell on my hands after picking tomatoes.  It is pure nostalgia to me and it puts a much younger me right back in my parent's backyard garden.

 

This year I bought my two plants, put them in their pots with their tomato cages, gave them decent soil, and set to the task of watering them regularly.  They shot right up.  In the meantime, a little tomato plant had started to struggle from the ground just beside my concrete patio.  It would have gotten morning sun, but been cut off from direct rain where it managed to start growing, which was shielded by the deck above.  This guy started growing from seeds probably lost from last year's plants.  Those with greener thumbs like to call this a 'volunteer' tomato plant.

 

The other thing you need to know about me is I'm a sucker for animals and even plants.  Someone cutting down a tree breaks my heart a little.  I had to give this tomato plant a chance.  I thought for sure I'd destroy its roots trying to pluck it from the ground pinched up against the concrete, but I had to try.  Out came the shovel.  I used a small pot that I had lying around because chances are it wouldn't go anywhere, but if it did I could always repot it.

 

I was so pleasantly surprised when it too took off like crazy, catching up with the other tomato plants in size in very little time.  Time to go buy him a big pot of his own and to buy more soil to "do it right" when I repotted him.

 

Because he was behind the other two, I saw blossoms when the others were giving tomatoes (which weren't all that tasty).  But still I watered and I waited.  Let's fast forward, because this volunteer plant is now easily 2x if not 3x the girth of the other two plants and just as tall.  He put off all kinds of branches.  I've slowly been reaping the rewards and the tomatoes are large, juicy, and quite tasty.  I've bragged a bit about him, that this little volunteer plant was giving me 5-10 really yummy tomatoes a day.

 

The other two plants went brown and died off.  They've been disassembled and put to the curb.  But the volunteer continues.  So when the temps at night were dropping towards the 40s it was time to offer a little more protection as to continue reaping the bounty.  It means that he doesn't get as much light, but he's now sitting in my basement near the back door to get as much morning light as possible.

 

This morning I picked off approximately 80 (not a typo - you read that right - eighty) ripe red tomatoes from this plant.  There is still a ton of green or not quite ripe tomatoes on there.

I feel so blessed.  I gave this plant an opportunity.  I invested in it.  I didn't have to, but I wanted to, and it cost me relatively little.  It exceeded my wildest expectations because, well, let's be honest, I didn't have too high of expectations for it.  I just gave it a chance.

 

You can write your own moral(s) to this story.  The ones God put on my heart are the value of life, that it's easy to change the course of that life, and that a small investment in someone or something else can bless you beyond measure.  Be blessed and be a blessing.