The Poopy Tomatoes

This is the story I tell when I want to efficiently prove to somebody that my mom is crazy.

(photo yanked from http://likethedew.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/tomatoes.jpg)

It begins over 2 years ago, when I received an email from my mother about composting with human waste. Google it- people are doing it. If you're okay with the idea of fertilizing your garden with human poop, there is a safe way to do it. It involves carefully composting said waste with a goodly amount of mulch or other biomaterials, and ensuring that the pile gets turned enough such that all the harmful bacteria are killed by the heat of the decomposing waste and mulch. So I read the article my mom had sent, was pretty certain that my mom wasn't going to follow these tedious instructions to do it safely, and emailed her back to let her know that it was a terrible idea.

Then I forgot about it for a year or so.

I visited home last summer while I was pregnant. I was sitting at the dining room table when my mom came by with some tomatoes. Try them, she told me. They are fresh picked from the garden! I reached for them, and then stopped.

"Wait, they're from the garden?"

"Yes. Fresh, so delicious."

"Are you fertilizing with poop?"

"Oh, that doesn't matter."

"Yes it does. Are you? I'm pregnant. If you're fertilizing with poop, you're running the risk of spreading disease. Remember cholera???"

"Aiya, you don't understand photosynthesis. There is no bacteria in the tomato!"

"Mom, this has nothing to do with photosynthesis! If you're fertilizing with poop, the bacteria is in the soil, and you can't tell me that the tomatoes aren't touching the soil!"

So after some fruitless arguing, my mom refused to believe me. I refused to eat the tomatoes, and my mom's feeling were hurt. I felt a little bad. Maybe my mom was composting the human poop the right way, and her tomatoes were safe to eat after all.

Fast forward a few weeks, when my sister's boyfriend was staying with my parents for two weeks to help them out with their business. (Oh, more on that later!) The maid told him what was really going on:

"She has me put grandma's dirty diapers in a pot, punch a few holes in it, and then has me bury it in the garden!"

One day, when my parents finally sell the house, some poor guy is going to be digging up the back garden and is going to find dozens of buckets, filled with soggy plastic diapers full of shit.