'Maters Matter

Six years ago, I wrote a column about the virtues of homegrown tomatoes.

Not the pithy, tasteless variety you find at the supermarket but those luscious, deep red ‘maters you grow in your backyard. Summer isn’t summer unless you spend half your time wiping tomato seeds off your chin.

Yes, tomato sandwiches are one of the joys of the season. I could truly eat them every day.

Yesterday, I had them for lunch and again for supper.

You know the recipe. White bread. Mayonnaise. Salt and pepper.

A country singer named Guy Clark once wrote a song about the joys of ‘maters called “Homegrown Tomatoes.’’ The chorus went like this:

Homegrown tomatoes.
Homegrown tomatoes.
What would life be like without homegrown tomatoes?
There’s only two things that money can’t buy.
And that’s true love and homegrown tomatoes.

The column brought hundreds of responses from tomato lovers from Flovilla to Lumber City. I’m also grateful for the friendship it has brought my family with John and Annette Kelley.

Not long after the column, John wrote and invited me to have lunch at the gazebo in his back yard. He had a garden and lots of tomatoes. He, too, had the recipe for happiness.

I did not know the Kelleys, but I accepted their invitation. It was a wonderful day, and they were very proud of their garden, which was full of butterbeans, cucumbers, okra and other vegetable delights. They told me I had a standing invitation to return every summer.

The next year, John wrote me on Good Friday to report he had planted 16 Big Boy tomato plants he bought from a man at Smiley’s Flea Market. “Give them 80 days, and we should be ready for another fine lunch with you,’’ he wrote.

My wife, Delinda, who is an even bigger tomato lover than I am, went with me. A tradition was born.

Now, John always writes me when he plants them in the spring, then usually gives me a progress report.

We returned Tuesday for the Seventh Annual Tomato Sandwich Day, and it was as delightful as ever. There always seems to be a breeze at the gazebo, and the Kelleys are gracious hosts. I ate three sandwiches, and was offered another but I was afraid they would talk about me if I had four sandwiches.

John said they were going to talk about me anyway, so I might as well.

Homegrown tomatoes. There’s nothing quite like ‘em.