Four years back we bought an apple tree from our neighborhood nursery. Verni’s Garden Center. The tree was grafted with no fewer than four branches each growing a different kind of apple. Somehow we thought this was a good idea for an apple tree.

But was it? Is it really a good idea to grow four different types of apples on one tree? Is this a way to make a truly special pie? We don’t know.

You may have noticed the apple’s distorted shape and its many, many worm holes and blemishes. Calvin brought this little sucker inside and claims he has eaten one or two or even more, and that they are tasty. The other night he made pork chops and apples sauce with the tree’s apples, and the apple sauce was good.

Now, apple sauce is pretty much always good—just add enough sugar and cinnamon—so I don’t take that as the measure of our apples. In fact, there are more worm holes on the other side of the apple pictured above.

Finally, the last note about apples. We watched Good Will Hunting a few weeks ago. We are desperate for acceptable family movies, and Good Will Hunting revealed the depths of our desperation. The apple joke—when Matt Damon shows these guys the Minnie Driver’s phone number and says, “How about those apples?”—was truly, truly underwhelming. It made me wish she Minnie Driver had hooked up with those guys and not Matt Damon.

Someday I would like to show someone walking by on the block a few of our mutant apple and ask that same question. That would be far more satisfying.