The tomatoes are coming in and here's my annual ode to my favorite vegetable.

I tried so hard not to write about food this week, but I was gifted with my first real tomato of the season and I can't let that occasion go unnoted.

Actually, there were several tomatoes, not just one, so I could enjoy them in every tomato way.

I had sliced tomatoes with salt and pepper and served on my special, green tomato plate. It was heaven.

I made bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwiches. The bacon wasn't great, but no one seemed to care because the tomatoes were divine.

I cooked country fried steak, the crunchy kind, and fresh peas and new potatoes and I sliced up one of those tomatoes. Man, oh, man.

I scrambled eggs and served them with a sliced tomato. While I can't eat at the table with someone who puts ketchup on their eggs, I can gobble down a whole tomato with a side of eggs.

I made Two Billies Tomatoes. I call them that because the concoction comes from two old goats I know. I won't get into the story. It's a long one and it isn't mine, but the tomatoes are sure tasty.

Take a fresh, ripe tomato. Slice it up thick, place it on a plate or paper towels and sprinkle with a little bit of sugar and a few drops of pepper sauce. Let the slices stand for 15 minutes or so. Yum.

I even had to use store bought pepper sauce. (My grandaddy would be so ashamed.) The tomatoes were still tops.

There was a day and time when I didn't treasure tomatoes so. Gosh, they used to be a dime a dozen and any fool, including this one, could grow them. Everyone had a tomato patch and, by this time of the year, everyone had buckets and buckets and buckets to share with city kin and friends who didn't have a patch.

Things are different now. Some spotted wilting disease that I can never remember takes out tomato plants before they hardly get started. In fact, I was a little glad to hear it was a disease and not my sheer lack of gardening skill.

Anyway, now that real tomatoes are harder to come by, we seem to treasure them more. I know I do.

I guess it is human nature to take for granted that which we have in abundance.

I guess it's just as much a part of our nature to miss it very much when it is gone, to try to grab what little of it we can while we can.

The same thought goes to all we hold dear, whether it is things or people or places. We don't always know what we had until it is gone.

Stop and taste the tomatoes.