FROM SEED TO FRUIT

For the past couple of years I've been experimenting with gardening. Nothing big, just a few large pot for some starter plants.  The patio tomatoes have been successful. The banana peppers, not so much.

I am doing better in my backyard experiment than last year and as I enjoy a sandwich, made with a tomato I grew, I meditate on how gardening is a lot like writing.

1. You start out with a seed of an idea. It may come from a dream, a "what if" idea, or an inner person that wants to be known by the outside world. Most people get these seeds.  They dismiss them and the seed is seldom planted.

2. Writers commit to the seed. They put words to paper--or electronic device. They are like the gardeners  as they outline and create a story.

3. The outline is finished. Now the writer, like the gardener, tills the soil and nurtures the seedling. The writer completes a book.

4. The gardener watches the plant grow and becomes impatient as time passes.  He has done all he can do. He feeds the plant and cares for it, but will he ever see any fruit? Boy, a writer knows about waiting.

5. Then, if he is diligent, there is finally a pay-off; fruit, the herb, the mature vegetable, or a flower blooms.  For the writer it is winning a contest, being published, having someone say your story touched them, or maybe even a contract.

That's good stuff.