There is a folksy song by Guy Clark that goes by that title. It’s been in and out of my head all day. The worst kind of ear worm. Or the best, depending on your perspective.

Homegrown tomatoes, home grown tomatoes!
Wha’d life be without homegrown tomatoes?
Only two things money can’t buy:
That’s true love and homegrown tomatoes.

Max did the penultimate tomato harvest this morning. He brought in about 30 pounds of his homegrown tomatoes. Together we steam peeled them, puréed the pulp, and strained out the seeds. Next we cooked the whole glorious mess down to a luxuriously red, thick tomato sauce, and carefully packed it into pint jars. Oh baby. For most of the day, my kitchen was a mess. It matters not. The end result was divine.

Plant ’em in the spring eat ’em in the summer
All winter without ’em’s a culinary bummer
I forget all about the sweatin’ & diggin’
Everytime I go out and pick me a big ‘un.

He planted way too many for the three of us to eat fresh, and not nearly enough for the amount I hoped we could have put up. Still, our harvest was breathtaking. Tomatoes are the essence of Summer. The overflowing bowls of juicy red fruit are rendered into a fragrant sauce, bubbling away on the stove. The promise of meaty lasagna with this lovely sauce layered between sheets of hand rolled pasta.

It’s nearly midnight now. I sit writing at our now-tidy dining room table. Ten hours ago it was a red-splattered crime scene, littered with tomato stems and translucent shards of skin, the juice of the tomatoes running off the table, down my legs and onto the floor. There was much joy and wise-crackery, with Max hovering over taking pictures with his phone. It was a fun project for us to do together.

Now, in the quiet air of this room, the fragrance of tomato lingers. This makes me smile. My hands feel soft and smooth from handling the precious fruit. God blessed me today.

The creepy, apocalyptic orange sky was all over the news today. The scientists tell us it is caused by an acrid combination of wildfire smoke and the marine layer. Ashy particles fell from the sky and coated all the cars. Everyone had an opinion about what it all portends. Maybe it is the end of the world.

But if it is, I will go to my reward knowing that my last hours on earth were spent with my son, canning tomatoes.