Don't pick my tomatoes!

<p>One beautiful summer day I was sitting at home, having just spoken with some tenants. The sky was crystal clear blue and the sun was beating down on my vines of peas and tomatoes. A rare day in the northwest. I could hear the children frolic outside on this glorious day. I relaxed inside but I could here a ruckus for the back side of the apartment. I swiftly moved to the back sliding screen door suspecting the worst.<br>
My wife had informed me only a few days before that the young children of the complex found a great deal of enjoyment out of plucking off my newly emerging green tomatoes. Once this fruit was in their hands, they would proceed to either sample the bitterness of the tomato or commence a squishy game of dodgeball. They had managed to obliterate my crop thus far with the exception of my largest prize tomato of the bunch. I had missed the first encounter but I was not about to let another massacre take place. <br>
Sure enough, as I came up to the screen door, I saw three little boys crowded around my tomato plant. I could not see what they were doing, but I couldn't let them rip off any more of my tomatoes. I threw open the sliding door with a bang and yelled, "No, don't pick my tomatoes." <br>
The ringleader in a Cars t-shirt and shorts stood amongst the knee-high squash and radishes in my garden, thrusting his fist into my tomato plant, hoping to grab a dark green beauty. His head quickly snapped in my direction to see who was disrupting his concentration. The noisy chatter from the boys died as I announced my presence from ten feet away. His beady black eyes met mine for a half second. Realizing that it was me, he sprang out of the box-garden and tried to make a hurried getaway with his comrades already a few steps in from of him. <br>
"Wait," I called out to them and they stopped moving their tiny legs. " I'm not going to hurt you. I want you to understand what this means for you to steal my tomatoes." They politely listened as I explained to them that I had been working really hard to make this garden grow, that it was something of great joy to me to see a seed grow into a plant, spout flowers and produce precious fruits and vegetables. "Please do not take any more of my tomatoes, otherwise I will be very sad," I concluded calmly. They were just being curious, adventurous.
But even so, I couldn't let this continue. Luckily, my largest tomato had not been plucked. It remained hidden under the dense layers of leaves growing from the plant. Though I had intervened this time, there were other boys on the property that would try their hand at ripping away my tomatoes. I had and would continue to protect my garden from those who would damage it, knowingly or not. </p>