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Description
I can still taste the moisture of that dawn. Disappointment: dizzying and bold, like spoiled espresso. Hope: firm and cucumber fresh, riddled with the seeds of newness. Amidst the sunrise's sky-bound nausea spectrum, I learned that one thing's coffin can be another's Love Box. It was the first experience that made my ribbons stir, and the first moment that made my heart race.

My caretaker had been stern, to say the least. Generous, but hard as sealed oak. They had made many mistakes, but foremost among them was their belief that fulfillment was uniform, that it always wore the same colors, the same perfume and name badge. Because their Fulfillment looked like a produce cart packed with yellow squash and camellias pink as dog gums, they thought mine would dress similarly. My caretaker took so much pride in their stall at the farmer's market, where they hawked bouquets and salad greens... But where they swooned over nature's cashmere and velvet, I saw one blinded by opulence. What need had squash to be so bright? It was bland mush on the inside, and its seeds clung to each chunk of flesh like fat little ticks.

Still, to avoid disappointing my caretaker or becoming the caricature of some unsuccessful wretch, I let them teach me how to farm vegetables and cultivate flowers. I swear to you that I put everything I had into those lessons! Every morning I was awake before the sun, clutching the handles of a wheel barrow that was taller than I was. My shoulder still bears the callus where the handle of a hoe dug into my newly-unboxed skin. I learned to sweat into manure-scented soil before I learned to speak. I'll even admit to you that I kind of liked the smell. So anyone who claims that I just wasn't applied to the agricultural trade, didn't have the patience or the work ethic to grow “something real” is full of shit. Fuller than fertile dirt.

Do you think I wanted to see those plants die under my mittened toddler paws? To think of myself as a walking disease that choked green stems every time I tried to learn a little more, to stand a little taller? I just didn't have the touch. My caretaker tried not to let me see their frustration each time a tomato exploded into a swarm of beetle larvae or a rose withered on the vine. They tried not to make it obvious that a blighted cluster of baby's breath meant more to them than my defeated sighs. They bought me a watering can and an ornately-woven basket with my name on them, custom pruning shears and a trowel made of materials they couldn't afford. How badly my caretaker tried to introduce me and their strain of Fulfillment. But with every bucket of compost, we remained strangers.

On the morning things changed, I awoke well before the dawn, probably around three. My insomnia had been birthed partially from determination and partially from anticipation. My caretaker had been helping me keep a row of hybrid tomato bushes alive. “These are hardier,” they'd said, smiling with exasperated eyes. “These 'maters can survive snowstorms and still come out sweet and red.” They'd held my paws with their ribbons as I sprayed plant food and insect deterrent on the bushes; they'd helped me erect little cages to keep the animals out. We'd both held our breath for the whole week as we'd watched bloated buds turn to green beads and swell into tiny proto-vegetables. The day before, a rainstorm had prevented us from checking the tomatoes, but my caretaker was certain they'd survive a little rain. The day following that, the day I awoke early, was the day the tomatoes should have been ripe; it was the day I was supposed to pick the first fruits of my labor, the day I would finally fill that damn weaver's opus of a basket. I was anxious to get out there and prove that I wasn't beyond help, that I was a farmer like my caretaker and not a fluffly, stupid little disease.

Hungry for success, I crept out of bed. My feet were still far too large for me then, and I almost gave myself away by stumbling over nonexistent obstacles on my way out of the farm house. The grass felt cold and sweaty beneath my feet; a purplish fog hung low like a bruise on the air. There was still a faint scent of ozone, which remains knotted into my memory. Not because I particularly liked or disliked the smell, but simply because of the association. I walked through rows of peppers perched sleepily on their vines like featherless parrots. I stumbled past the leafy burrows of squash and pumpkins, cursing the hollow thunk my toes made when I accidentally hit one. Finally, I found myself in the little grove my caretaker had set aside for me. The compost cemetery that reeked of barrenness and failure. Through the fog, I could see the familiar leaves of my tomato bushes, and I began to walk faster, soaking my ankles in dew. The more quickly I tried to move, the more I tripped, as if I was caught in the quicksand of my own clumsiness.

When, at last, I found myself in front of my tomato plants, my heart sank; my stomach lurched and twisted. The leaves had all yellowed and wilted. Where there had once been tiny fruits, there were now spongey, debilitated stems. A halo of red and green splatters lay on the ground, swarmed by fruit flies. I felt my legs give way beneath me. I buckled to the ground, my paws landing in the funereal mush that had once been my tomatoes, my tail dragging in the mud. I almost puked. Dead. They were all dead. I couldn't even keep these supposedly invincible tomatoes alive for one harvest. I let my elbows go slack, and my paws folded beneath me. My chin met the ground. I just lay there, my body and soul aching with grief, my body quaking with sobs.

I can't say how long I was on the ground, but I know it was awhile. I hadn't even planned on getting up. I was going to wait for my caretaker to find me and carry me to wherever it was people carried failures. Some part of me had other ideas, however. As I lay there, one tail of my ribbon rose up, slow and shuddering, like a cautious snake. As if possessed of its own spirit, or more likely my subconscious, my ribbon reached forward, tickling my neck, and pushed aside leaves and tomato slime. There, hidden near the ground, growing from one of the dark red tomato carcasses was a cluster of minuscule mushrooms. My heart thumping, I blinked and sat up. Taking conscious control of my ribbon, I dug through the organic ruin. I managed to coax my ribbon's other tail into collaborative motion. Amidst the graves of my tomatoes I found three other clusters of mushrooms and one patch of grayish, fuzzy mold. The mushrooms' thin stalks and pearly caps seemed like something otherworldly. Something strangely beautiful and anomalous. Persevering ghosts of my tomato plants.

Furrowing my brow with concentration, I used my ribbon to pick a single mushroom. It felt smooth and cool. The brown gills underneath its cap seemed, somehow, like the most honest thing I had ever had the fortune of holding. More honest than even my own tears. More humble than a saint. Far more beautiful than any ripe tomato.

Description
I can still taste the moisture of that dawn. Disappointment: dizzying and bold, like spoiled espresso. Hope: firm and cucumber fresh, riddled with the seeds of newness. Amidst the sunrise's sky-bound nausea spectrum, I learned that one thing's coffin can be another's Love Box. It was the first experience that made my ribbons stir, and the first moment that made my heart race.

My caretaker had been stern, to say the least. Generous, but hard as sealed oak. They had made many mistakes, but foremost among them was their belief that fulfillment was uniform, that it always wore the same colors, the same perfume and name badge. Because their Fulfillment looked like a produce cart packed with yellow squash and camellias pink as dog gums, they thought mine would dress similarly. My caretaker took so much pride in their stall at the farmer's market, where they hawked bouquets and salad greens... But where they swooned over nature's cashmere and velvet, I saw one blinded by opulence. What need had squash to be so bright? It was bland mush on the inside, and its seeds clung to each chunk of flesh like fat little ticks.

Still, to avoid disappointing my caretaker or becoming the caricature of some unsuccessful wretch, I let them teach me how to farm vegetables and cultivate flowers. I swear to you that I put everything I had into those lessons! Every morning I was awake before the sun, clutching the handles of a wheel barrow that was taller than I was. My shoulder still bears the callus where the handle of a hoe dug into my newly-unboxed skin. I learned to sweat into manure-scented soil before I learned to speak. I'll even admit to you that I kind of liked the smell. So anyone who claims that I just wasn't applied to the agricultural trade, didn't have the patience or the work ethic to grow “something real” is full of shit. Fuller than fertile dirt.

Do you think I wanted to see those plants die under my mittened toddler paws? To think of myself as a walking disease that choked green stems every time I tried to learn a little more, to stand a little taller? I just didn't have the touch. My caretaker tried not to let me see their frustration each time a tomato exploded into a swarm of beetle larvae or a rose withered on the vine. They tried not to make it obvious that a blighted cluster of baby's breath meant more to them than my defeated sighs. They bought me a watering can and an ornately-woven basket with my name on them, custom pruning shears and a trowel made of materials they couldn't afford. How badly my caretaker tried to introduce me and their strain of Fulfillment. But with every bucket of compost, we remained strangers.

On the morning things changed, I awoke well before the dawn, probably around three. My insomnia had been birthed partially from determination and partially from anticipation. My caretaker had been helping me keep a row of hybrid tomato bushes alive. “These are hardier,” they'd said, smiling with exasperated eyes. “These 'maters can survive snowstorms and still come out sweet and red.” They'd held my paws with their ribbons as I sprayed plant food and insect deterrent on the bushes; they'd helped me erect little cages to keep the animals out. We'd both held our breath for the whole week as we'd watched bloated buds turn to green beads and swell into tiny proto-vegetables. The day before, a rainstorm had prevented us from checking the tomatoes, but my caretaker was certain they'd survive a little rain. The day following that, the day I awoke early, was the day the tomatoes should have been ripe; it was the day I was supposed to pick the first fruits of my labor, the day I would finally fill that damn weaver's opus of a basket. I was anxious to get out there and prove that I wasn't beyond help, that I was a farmer like my caretaker and not a fluffly, stupid little disease.

Hungry for success, I crept out of bed. My feet were still far too large for me then, and I almost gave myself away by stumbling over nonexistent obstacles on my way out of the farm house. The grass felt cold and sweaty beneath my feet; a purplish fog hung low like a bruise on the air. There was still a faint scent of ozone, which remains knotted into my memory. Not because I particularly liked or disliked the smell, but simply because of the association. I walked through rows of peppers perched sleepily on their vines like featherless parrots. I stumbled past the leafy burrows of squash and pumpkins, cursing the hollow thunk my toes made when I accidentally hit one. Finally, I found myself in the little grove my caretaker had set aside for me. The compost cemetery that reeked of barrenness and failure. Through the fog, I could see the familiar leaves of my tomato bushes, and I began to walk faster, soaking my ankles in dew. The more quickly I tried to move, the more I tripped, as if I was caught in the quicksand of my own clumsiness.

When, at last, I found myself in front of my tomato plants, my heart sank; my stomach lurched and twisted. The leaves had all yellowed and wilted. Where there had once been tiny fruits, there were now spongey, debilitated stems. A halo of red and green splatters lay on the ground, swarmed by fruit flies. I felt my legs give way beneath me. I buckled to the ground, my paws landing in the funereal mush that had once been my tomatoes, my tail dragging in the mud. I almost puked. Dead. They were all dead. I couldn't even keep these supposedly invincible tomatoes alive for one harvest. I let my elbows go slack, and my paws folded beneath me. My chin met the ground. I just lay there, my body and soul aching with grief, my body quaking with sobs.

I can't say how long I was on the ground, but I know it was awhile. I hadn't even planned on getting up. I was going to wait for my caretaker to find me and carry me to wherever it was people carried failures. Some part of me had other ideas, however. As I lay there, one tail of my ribbon rose up, slow and shuddering, like a cautious snake. As if possessed of its own spirit, or more likely my subconscious, my ribbon reached forward, tickling my neck, and pushed aside leaves and tomato slime. There, hidden near the ground, growing from one of the dark red tomato carcasses was a cluster of minuscule mushrooms. My heart thumping, I blinked and sat up. Taking conscious control of my ribbon, I dug through the organic ruin. I managed to coax my ribbon's other tail into collaborative motion. Amidst the graves of my tomatoes I found three other clusters of mushrooms and one patch of grayish, fuzzy mold. The mushrooms' thin stalks and pearly caps seemed like something otherworldly. Something strangely beautiful and anomalous. Persevering ghosts of my tomato plants.

Furrowing my brow with concentration, I used my ribbon to pick a single mushroom. It felt smooth and cool. The brown gills underneath its cap seemed, somehow, like the most honest thing I had ever had the fortune of holding. More honest than even my own tears. More humble than a saint. Far more beautiful than any ripe tomato.