Blueberries

Blueberries

One of the best features of my grandparents’ grounds, was the blueberry patch behind the house. There were more than 400 bushes. Summer on the Farm was an exciting time of year. . . at least at the beginning of picking season.  To this day we Gildea cousins can easily summon the sound of those first berries hitting the metal bottom of the Maxwell House cans.  Skilled pickers, as we were, were delivered early to the patch in order to get the work done before the heat of the day made the whole thing a sweaty affair.  Sweat management was relative to the blueberries, not the pickers.  You knew to handle the berries as little as possible; one hand tenderly held the branch still, while the thumb and either the index or middle finger of the other gently rolled each berry from its cluster.  You didn’t drop the berries individually into the can, which was suspended by a jute cord around your neck, the cord growing increasingly irritating as the day wore on.  Instead, you accumulated a bunch in your hand and just short of them becoming a teeming and testy crowd, you dropped the bunch into the can.   There were 5 cent cans, 10 cent cans, and 25 cent (gallon) cans.  Until the height of the season, I found it more useful to work with the smallest (5 cent) can, and repeatedly dump it into the 25 cent can, which I would leave at the beginning of my row.  Chris was a great one for creating mischief in the blueberry patch.  He always managed to be out the back door and sprinting to the best-producing section of the patch before I had even selected my cans.  Naturally, the legal language governing behavior in the blueberry patch was ever-evolving, with new amendments added regularly.  Chris bested me with his “territoriality” claims at every turn.  I don’t think I ever was allowed access to the best bushes. . . unless I was picking alone.  He would be sauntering back up to the house, casually windmilling his filled 25 cent bucket; I, on the other hand, would be viewing the contents of my cans with the usual disappointment. 

The back room off the summer kitchen was where the sorting took place.  I most likely wasn’t allowed to perform that responsibility until I had reached the most awkward stage of life - puberty.  No one is fit to learn a new skill at age eleven or twelve, so my first stabs at it were failures; the criticism was that I overhandled the berries.  I was too aggressive when shaking them in the screened boxes that served to sift out the stems and small leaves.  Frankly, I shook the shit out of them, as I was determined that my eye would pick out every last interloper.  In picking out the dreaded “mummy” berries (whose spores can spread disease), as well as the green unripe ones, my fingers didn’t move with the delicacy required.  With practice, however, I did become very adept; eventually I could manage the whole process with great confidence, even delivering to stores, such as Caswell’s in Middleboro.  It is my eternal shame that when I was finally old enough and skilled enough, I didn’t step up and help more when the demands of the Farm began to outstrip Papa Joe’s ability to keep pace with them.  Why did I think once I reached age 15 that holding hands and kissing David were more important things to do than helping my grandparents?

Side note:  Chris was a perfect foil in my growing up years.  Since I am closest in age to him, I took him more seriously than was ever good for me.  His intrigues most likely arose from the simple pleasure of witnessing my predictable outbursts and meltdowns.  I played the victim especially well.