100 Words on Love: Tomatoes

The first summer I grew tomatoes in my garden in Brooklyn was a major triumph. Wrestling through 9 inches of concrete slab, marauding tomato-picking rats, those really ugly freakshow green horned worms. I picked the first little bucket of cherry tomatoes and brought them to the office to share. Carefully holding the bucket so as not get any smushed I am stunned by their beauty, robust gleam of their skin, arched stems. I set back on my heels in a cowboy squat, pulled out a pen, and drew their portraits hunched in the steel dust and shrieks of the subway.