At the local farmer’s market, I tasted a new plum today, one crossed with a watermelon. We already have plums crossed with apricots. For that matter we have yellow tomatoes and watermelons, white eggplants and marbled beets. I suppose this is only a beginning and that coming up with new combinations and colors will continue. It began in order to lengthen shelf life and make produce more marketable and it continues as the taste for the exotic and the new grows. By the time my 8-month old neighbor graduates from high school how different will the market produce section look? Will her generation still use the analogy beet red? For that matter will they decide down the road that beet juice stains too easily and do away with red beets altogether? Will she know what old fashioned veggies look like, the way nature originally made them? Will she have to go to some form of planetarium for old fashioned vegetables to find out? More to the point are all these innovations making a better world, or just a different one?