Homegrown Tomatoes by Guy Clark

Sometimes my blog gets bogged down with topics that reflect my feelings of drowning in the heaviness of every day living. I started this blog to help me both process the death of my brother last fall and to celebrate and remember his life in pictures and stories. Regardless, I strive for a variety of topics, All Things Important if you will.

On that note, what could be more important in mid-July than Homegrown Tomatoes. Frankly, I can’t remember the first time I heard this song by Guy Clark or when I started playing it every summer while preparing a BLT or batch of gazpacho. It creates the perfect mood and brings a smile to my face every time. Turn it up next time you enjoy your homegrown tomatoes, either from your backyard or the local Farmer’s Market.

Guy Clark singing "Homegrown Tomatoes" (2010)

Lyrics: It is impossible to hear this song and not want to sing along!

Ain't nothin' in the world that I like better

Than bacon & lettuce & homegrown tomatoes

Up in the mornin' out in the garden

Get you a ripe one don't get a hard one

Plant `em in the spring eat `em in the summer

All winter with out `em's a culinary bummer

I forget all about the sweatin' & diggin'

Every time I go out & pick me a big one

Homegrown tomatoes homegrown tomatoes

What'd life be without homegrown tomatoes

Only two things that money can't buy

That's true love & homegrown tomatoes

You can go out to eat & that's for sure

But it's nothin' a homegrown tomato won't cure

Put `em in a salad, put `em in a stew

You can make your very own tomato juice

Eat `em with eggs, eat `em with gravy

Eat `em with beans, pinto or navy

Put `em on the site put `em in the middle

Put a homegrown tomato on a hotcake griddle

If I's to change this life I lead

I'd be Johnny Tomato Seed

`Cause I know what this country needs

Homegrown tomatoes in every yard you see

When I die don't bury me

In a box in a cemetery

Out in the garden would be much better

I could be pushin' up homegrown tomatoes