Time and Strawberries Wait for No One

   Nature, the weather and plants have their own schedule--and they never check with humans when making it. A quick check of last year's garden journal last month revealed that this year's strawberry crop was coming a full three weeks early thanks to a spell of unseasonably warm weather and ample spring rain. The harvest was record-breaking: 83 quarts by the time I gave up and sacrifice the rest to the birds last week.
Unfortunately, the last of the peak picking days (14 quarts one day, 20 two days later) came just after I left for a week-long trip to Tennessee with my daughter. I processed 12 pints and 8 half pints of jam, along with 25 bags of frozen berries in the days before leaving. I arrived in Tennessee with a back sore from stooping and hands stained reddish-brown from hours of washing and hulling berries. When I returned, I added some fruit leather to my pantry, on the suggestion of a fellow gardener who makes real "rollups" for his kids. All in all, I 'm pleased with what I've stored up for the winter, and I had ample quarts to share with neighbors, friends and family.
   I left my husband and son at home with the strawberries, but with school and work, they didn't have the couple of hours daily that it takes to pick the beds thoroughly. I invited a friend to come over to pick and take home all she could. I'm not sure my husband understood the innate urgency I feel when it comes to not wasting a single berry and to saving as much of the fruits of my labor as I can. The thought of my berries lying "mouldering" on the ground made me feel a bit sick.

   The intensity of the strawberry season--and in turn, blueberries, blackberries, peaches and so on--reminds me yet again of the unforgiving cycle of farming. "Farmers must never go on vacation, except in winter," I moaned on my Facebook page as I packed for my trip. Then again, by winter they might be too tired to vacation. I recall the words of Anna Willson of Trumpington in Kent County, Maryland in the late 1800s. She struggled to entertain summer guests at the time of the peach harvest, after which her husband declared, "never again will we have staying guests during peach season." By the winter, with the preparations for the Christmas season following hog butchering, Anna was exhausted and decided against taking an excursion to Baltimore or even to attend holiday parties.

   I also reflect on the situation of the local and migrant pickers, especially as my back aches and my knees groan after spending only a half hour or so stooped in picking. Although it may have been a relief to have a period of guaranteed work, the prospect of 12-plus-hour days spent bent over with forearms immersed in itchy strawberry vines must have tempered any enthusiasm. Historically, the abysmally low pay and substandard housing provided made life tremendously difficult for this under class of workers. But they, like me, were carried along on the tide of the season, working as hard and as long as necessary to get the job done. Then a break--often brief--until the next harvest wave arrived.