Hope

One shopping trip to Lowe's this past spring and a simple purchase is now teaching me a lesson in the childish hope of unrealistic things. Zachary picked out a seed packet as shown below with a HUGE pumpkin and a child standing beside it. He just "HAD" to have it and as much as Shawn and I thought that it wasn't a good idea to get his hopes up, we decided to spend the $2 and buy him a whole whopping 3 pumpkin seeds. Sometimes it takes some failures in life to learn our lessons. I'd certainly had many experiences as a kid where I was naive and gullible and got my hopes smashed as the reality of the situation became apparent.

So, as Shawn planted the corn, tomatoes, carrots, beans, and other garden veggies, Zachary also planted his pumpkin seed. With us being 'hopeless' I guess you could say, or maybe just dumb, we didn't plot a spot for a 500 pound pumpkin or strategically place the seed. We just let him pick a nice little spot where he could take care of the thing and learn that more than likely, it would not meet his expectations.

Well, a couple months into the 'project' and we have a nice large pumpkin, still white, so still growing. The leaves are enormous and spreading fast. The vine has taken over most of the remaining part of the garden and is sneaking into our backyard. Already, Shawn accidentally picked one basketball sized white pumpkin as the vine snapped when he was re-situating it so it didn't get a flat spot. We now have plenty more buds and a few very promising pumpkins that are growing. The excitement is evident, not only in Zachary, but with Shawn as well. There is talk of 'state fair' and 'hiding place for halloween' or 'many many pumpkin pies'. The books we read last fall of the enormous pumpkins are becoming more realistic and hope that we thought would be faded is only growing. A child, hoping and believing in the impossible or unrealistic and yet spreading that hope with cynical and unbelieving adults.

We will continue to track the pumpkins progress and have made plans to get it onto a wooden pallet should it start to get too large.