Volleyball and Apples

Volleyball season has begun at our house.  This will be the second year that my youngest daughter has played, and she really loves the game.  She works hard at her practices; and in her down time at home, she loves to work on her serves out in the back yard.  And it just so happens that I have a small apple tree in this very same back yard.  My neighbors gave it to me several years ago, and it has never produced any apples.  However, this past spring I counted 25 blossoms on it which gave me great hope that it might bear fruit this year.  When the blossoms withered away, we counted three apples on it.  But one day during serving practice, the volleyball headed directly toward my apple tree, and promptly knocked off two little apples.  I think this was such a fluke that even if I had told my daughter to aim for those little tiny apples, she never would have hit them.  But in the big scope of things, I would never have traded seeing my daughter out working hard at improving a skill and enjoying herself for those apples.  Besides, I still have one left on the tree, and now I know that it actually can bring forth apples ----- maybe next year.