There are so many fascinating things in the world you have to wonder how anyone can ever possibly be bored. It seems to me that people who are easily bored rely on a limited number of artificial things for entertainment (TV, the Internet, video games…) and when they are temporarily separated from those things or those things let them down (i.e. “There’s nothing to watch on TV.”) they don’t know what to do with themselves and they get bored.

I know that most people don’t find clouds, plants, birds, insects and so forth as fascinating as I do (not to mention reading, sewing and listening to music) but maybe that’s because they’ve gotten acclimated to the artificial things. That happens fairly early in life for most people. Take a walk with a two-year-old. He will stomp in puddles, stop to examine weeds, chase bugs, get massively excited over finding an earthworm, even be momentarily fascinated with cracks in the sidewalk. A couple of years later you’ll be lucky to even get him to voluntarily go on a walk. He might miss his favorite TV show.

Yes, I do get bored sometimes. Mostly I get bored when something is keeping me from the things that fascinate me and sometimes that something is only myself. I have been known to sit around and complain that there’s nothing on TV. But I do think I have an inner two-year-old. I think we all do. Some people are too much in touch with their inner terrible two-year-old. We all need to send that little guy or gal to his or her room and wake up our inner curious two-year-old – the one who still thinks beetles and dandelions are pretty cool.

Our first tomato. I took this picture this morning right after I had watered everything and as soon as I got the camera close to the tomato the lens started fogging up but I sort of like the way it turned out. We planted the tomatoes next to our back porch so we could tie them to the lattice.