Gardening and writing

Every time I pick up a tomato and cut it open now, I despair that I failed horticulture miserably. You don't know what you are getting anymore. The tomato might look fine on the outside (although that seems to be pretty rare) but on the inside....ugh, another wasted vegetable in the bin.

I went to an agricultural school. I learned how to milk cows. My father grew vegetables. Why did I pay so little attention? Was it because I always was escaping to fantasy worlds?I was transported by the written word to places that I could only dream of, places that only lived in my imagination.

I am a gardener. Just a different sort.

I plant the seeds deep in my subconscious. Sometimes the seeds have floated in on the wind, and I'm not even aware that they have landed in my garden bed and implanted themselves into the soil until the first sprout of an idea. I fertilise the idea with characters, settings - turn it around in my subconscious until it starts emerging from my imagination as a scene or a story. Other times, I am conscious of the seed appearing, and I may even brainstorm it, picking the right conditions for the seed to flourish and become a story.

So I have chosen to be a gardener of stories and I enjoy it. Enjoy the whole imaginative process from the time that the seed is planted to when it emerges as a beautiful flower or tree. Yes, it's hard work. But I can see something as a result - a product of the labour. I may not be able to eat it, but I can savour the writing, enjoy it, share it with others.

Growing tomatos, on the other hand, looks like hard work. And once the tomato is eaten, it's gone.

So the current patch of ground is Beyond Happily Ever After and the story is growing:

52,491 / 60,000 (87.5%)

Soon I hope it will blossom.