It’s called the king of antioxidants. A little berry that grows on bushes. Symbolic, sometimes, for a sad feeling and named for its color. You know the berry. It’s the blueberry!
Good morning! Ugh, my alarm is way too loud. Last night I had a dream that was about the sleeping arrangements here. I was sleeping in a room with all of the others WWOOFers and in the dream there was a cat and a dog at the house. The cat kept messing with me as I was trying to get to sleep, clawing at my face and clothes, so I shut the door to the room while it was out. I vaguely remember starting to undress when another girl came in. We then started dancing to nonexistent music. She wasn’t anyone I recognized. After we were significantly tired out we all hopped into bed, five of us on the bottom bunk and six on the top.
An odd dream for certain. It made me sort of chuckle when I reentered consciousness that morning. The actual sleeping arrangements were much more accommodating. Alice and I were staying in the mother-in-law suite, complete with our own bathroom and an entire wall of books. There was a twin sized bed sitting against the wall under an east facing window and a squat queen next to the door. Rosa told us we'd have to fight over them, but we both wanted what the other didn't, which was convenient, because I wanted the bigger bed of course. My sleep positions have evolved over time from fetus to yearner to something all over the bed that doesn't fit into any category. Anyhow, my sleep position couldn't care less about labels. Patricia occupied a bedroom on the other side of the house and Mikey was staying in the office, a room attached to the garage down by the blueberry patch and the gate.
Oh. My. Goodness. There is so much to tell about just the first part of this day, because so much happened. First, my annoying alarm woke me up at 6:30. Oh yeah, there was a really loud storm during the night. Lightning, thunder, rain, and hail were all on the menu. I ended up falling asleep though, because I was so pooped. I was happy there was rain for Rosa because she wanted it to wash away the smoke in the air.
There were forests burning up all around us and the smoke levels were visibly changing every day. Rosa said that she was hoping the rain would wash the particles from the air and they probably did that night, but the fires were persistent. The smoke had returned in the morning, casting a dirty hue over everything outside, the valley and surrounding mountains seemingly in a giant bubble of grey.
I got up and took a shower and soon we all stumbled into the kitchen for breakfast. I had granola and almond milk, water, and a cup of English breakfast with more almond milk. Then we drove down to the blueberry field where Alice and I learned how to pick the berries.
The plants were bushes, Rosa's ranging from three to five feet tall, planted in rows. They had them fenced in with 20 foot tall fencing to keep out deer, elk and other animals. Netting was fastened to the fencing and pulled across the top of the patches. This was done to shade the plants from too much sunlight and keep out smaller pests like birds and rodents. Harvesting instructions started like this:
Only pick the blue ones.
That seemed self explanatory to me, but the trick was that there were multiple shades of blue and it took a careful eye -especially under the shade of the foliage- to pick the right one. Not the whiteish blue or greenish blue which were the colors of unripe fruit, or the reddish blue which could be sunburnt, but the deep purpley blue. They often had a light and even dusting of white on them, a protective waxy coating called bloom and a sign of a healthy berry. Naturally produced, it provided a barrier from things that might harm the plant, such as bacteria or insects.
We picked with a method called tickling. This was the act of lightly pulling and twisting the berries off of the stem it grew from. Each of us had a bucket for perfect ones and a bucket for bruised, overripe, or ones with grasshopper kisses.
Grasshopper kisses were little marks that looked like hickies. They were left on a berry when one of the insects had been eating it.
Inedible ones were thrown through the fence or put in trays under the sitting carts. The carts are like little swiveling chairs equipped with wheels, so that you can sit while you pick. We went row by row wherever Rosa told us to pick next. The storm had knocked many berries off of the plants, so we made sure to pick up all the berries on the ground as well. The main reason for this was that so the bushes didn’t develop mummy berry, a fungus that will take over and kill the whole plant.
The fungal disease takes advantage of dead berries on the ground and creates a home for the pathogen over winter. When spring comes the affected fruit turn into tiny mushrooms in a creepy, plant-possession transformation. Want to learn more about mummy berry and how to deal with it? Check out this article on the Good Fruit Grower.
It was nice just harvesting for hours, thinking, listening to the music coming from Mikey’s phone, and telling stories while getting to know Patricia and Alice. The daily word of advice: swat the grasshoppers and just slowly move away from the yellow jackets. There were plenty of each buzzing and hopping around us, which brings me to our next activity, also ridden with the lovely little stinging machines. After we cleaned up the grape vines Rosa had been pruning, we rode over to the small peach orchard and took a look at the damage that the hailstorm had done to the trees. There were entire limbs broken off and almost all the trees were LOADED with underripe peaches. It was an incredibly sad sight, but we went to work hauling the branches that Rosa sawed off to the burn pile.
At this point in my writing I took a break to take the compost out with Mikey. He showed me where the pile was, back in a far corner of the garden and close to the road. The sun was high, illuminating the smoke that hung in the air. We washed out the buckets under the spray of a hose and climbed the hill back to the house.
We took the green peaches and threw them for the deer and elk to eat. The ones that were far enough along that they could finish ripening on the kitchen counter we collected. There were quite a few that were swarming with yellow jackets. We started to harvest the single tree that was ripe and they were swarming so much -almost too much, but we were being careful. We kept going and did get a lot of peaches. Near the end though, I felt the inevitable pierce of a stinger and I let out a loud “ow.” Right as Mikey looked over at me, our eyes met and “f***” suddenly escaped me. It was known then by everyone that I’d been stung and that our work day was over. Rosa rushed me back to the house to suck the venom out with a little suction cup syringe and dab me with an alcohol wipe and some Neosporin. I’m feeling much more relief now and lunch is ready, so I’ll write more later!
Update. Just got dirty cutting up the peaches we collected earlier. I'm going to help Rosa make a giant peach crisp. Before lunch I helped prepare by mixing Swiss chard, garlic, and spices into a bowl of ricotta. I then spread the mixture onto and in between layers of pasta and lobster Rosa had laid out in a glass dish. Dave cooked it on the grill and it was quite tasty. Now, after filling myself, my stomach is bubbling and I feel really gassy. I’m too embarrassed to tell them that I’m moderately lactose intolerant or especially that I’m trying to be vegan. Anyway, we had lunch and then cleaned up and cut the peaches. Now I’m writing. Duh. Mikey is on the couch reading a novel, Patricia is in her room, I think, Dave is doing computer work and Rosa is at the table fitting together pieces of a puzzle. The sun is actually starting to peek through the smoke now, but Rosa shut the blinds to conserve the coolness of the house. I think I should write a book. Yeah. This is my book. Let’s start off with a doodle.
That was a good doodle. Now my hand’s sore. And I have no idea what to do now. Hmmmm….
I went for a walk with Alice, made dinner for myself, went to the hot springs with the gang, and jammed out with Mikey.
Mikey had a guitar. He'd started just a month or so earlier, but played like a pro. Even when fiddling around and picking random melodies it sounded like he was meant to be on a stage. I'd finger my ukulele when I could grasp what chords he was playing and brought out my own tunes when he'd look down to study a new song on his laptop. Together we strummed through folk and alternative pop, singing along when we'd find a song that we both knew AND knew how to play.
It’s too late to write any more. I’ll write more in the morning.
Names and details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals.
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