Spreading kindness along with homegrown tomatoes

The Boston Globe

August 24, 2020

Beverly Beckham

I am trying to focus on the tomatoes. The ones I found yesterday in a small plastic bag hanging from the handle of my front door. Cherry tomatoes, still warm from the garden. Tony brought them. He did the same thing last year and the year before, delivered tomatoes then slipped away, not ringing the bell, not looking for a thank you.

I haven’t seen Tony in a year. Neither has my husband. We all live in the same town. We usually see each other around. We say hi and talk a little. This is our connection. The tomatoes are always an unexpected and appreciated gift.

Especially this year. I took them inside and placed them in a bowl next to another bowl full of tomatoes: beefsteak, Brandywines, Cherokee purples, names I had to look up. I didn’t know there were so many kinds of tomatoes. They are gifts from Ralph, another gardener who is generous and kind. And then there are Fran’s tomatoes — from my daughter’s neighbor, who came over to my daughter’s deck a few nights ago. She was carrying two pint boxes full of small, home-grown orange tomatoes. “One for you and one for your mother,” she said.

More generosity.

I look at the tomatoes and tell myself that they are a sign that not everything is wrong in this world. I pick them up. I smell earth in them and think, I did nothing to deserve even the smallest of them. And yet here they are — mine. I didn’t have to work for them. I didn’t have to barter or trade or borrow. I have reaped the bounty of someone else’s labor. Why? Because, despite almost everything we read and see on TV, there are decent people on this planet.

These people are not on the evening news. They don’t make headlines. Kindness seldom makes headlines.

When I was much younger than I am now, I believed that people were born good, and that circumstances, not anything intrinsic, snuffed the good out of them. I’m not sure I believe this now. But I do believe that there’s more good going on in the world than we know about.

I e-mailed a few friends last month asking for books for a gentleman who’s been shut inside a senior complex since mid-March. Most of the seniors in his building are women, which means the shared shelf that is their library has more Nicholas Sparks than Robert Ludlum. Not that this gentleman is complaining. “I’ll read anything,” he says.

My friend Chuck stopped by with two bags of books for this man. Elaine stopped by with more books. My neighbor Peter wrote back and asked, “What does your friend like to read? What are his interests?” And when I said music, he said, “Perfect,” and dropped off three beautiful, the-spine-hasn’t-been-broken-yet hardcover biographies about musicians.

These are the kind things ordinary people do all the time, every day, day after day. I believe in these ordinary people.

I watch the news and think I don’t want to leave my house. It’s crazy out in the world. But then I go to Trader Joe’s and everyone there is following the rules, keeping their distance and wearing masks. Being patient. And kind. Then I go to Polillio’s Garden Center to buy flowers and everyone there is following the rules, too, smiling. Helping others. Doing the best they can.

The people who rant and rave? On Twitter. On Facebook. On television. The people who continue to divide us, who pit us against each other? I don’t know them. They are not in my life. But Tony is. And Fran is. And Ralph. And Elaine and Chuck and Peter. Regular people, doing good, sharing what they have.

I look at my tomatoes, the few that are left, and, for now anyway, I have some hope for the world.