Summer Blues

Long time, no blog.

It's summer.

Summer is:
Hot
Humid
Busy for Librarianing
Blueberry Harvests
B.P. Oil Spill
Exhausting
Dealing with death and dying
Cutting Grass
Tending the garden
Walking the Hound

FULL

Yes, I've been a bit overwhelmed. There are so many words in my head that I don't even know how to start getting them out. I do miss this little corner. It's a bit bleak knowing that there is no point in checking in as I know for a fact I haven't blogged.

Hopefully, things are calming down and I will stop here more often.

The photo to the left is of the lovely hundreds year old oak tree that shaded my Mother and me last Saturday at the U-Pick Blueberry farm. We had a lovely morning. We both ran into friends and were able to catch up with others and each other. Plus, most of labor was spent in the shade, which made our time very pleasant. Now, there are lots of berries in the freezer ready for pancakes, muffins, yogurt toppings, and who knows what else. Yum!

That Time of Year

Tonight, dinner was "Blueberry Pancakes for Dinner Night". I'm almost to the end of the '09 blueberries that I horded in the freezer.

As Fin helped himself to the blackberry syrup he asked, "When do the blackberries bloom?" I replied, "They're blooming right now." "Oh good" Fin answers, "now we don't have to be stingy" (with the syrup).

I pointed out that we won't have blackberries until May (the end of May). He then pointed out to me that it was a good thing it was the end of April.

Of course, although I tell Fin that we have to use the syrup sparingly because it's only a renewable resource once a year, the truth is that each time he (or I) spoons out a big pancake swallowing helping I flashback to weeks on end of coming home from work and then out to the blackberries to wrestle those luscious little berries out of the bramble. I remember the countless scratches, blackberry canes trying to eat my hat, and then the hours of processing berries, boiling juice, heating the water for the water bath, and getting jars and rings ready. When the last blackberry was processed and put away last summer, I knew that I might never give any of that syrup away. After all, I'm the only one that will ever be able to truly appreciate the value of one of those little jars of syrup.

Bethany's Tips for Blackberry-ing

For weeks now a lot of my spare time has gone to the blackberries. Falling in the ranks of the those strange people that get an actual thrill from picking things from a real live plant and then eating them versus the folks that find the aesthetics of supermarket plastic appealing, I was thrilled when I realized the back of the new property is ringed with native blackberries.

However, to be completely honest I had no idea how long picking blackberries took and I'd never truly internalized the meaning of blackberry brambles. Brambles they are thorny, grabby, sticky things that reach out for your hat or your hair. They grasp and take hold of your shirt and your gloves and on the unprepared and uncovered they are certainly willing to tangle themselves in the skin you are in.

Thankfully, I've devised an almost full-proof system for safe and effective blackberry-ing and am only sporting minimal scars from my endeavors. My system includes tongs from the kitchen, heavy leather gloves, a long sleeve shirt, and hat, mosquito repellent and moves that would make my yoga teacher proud. In fact, who needs to practice yoga when they see the most beautiful blackberry just beyond reach and go into the "just a little bit further" blackberry pose?

I do enjoy myself out there. I have a strange sense of accomplishment from picking things my very own self and I've made several pints of blackberry syrup (which I'm here to tell you is an excellent combination with whole wheat flax blueberry pancakes) and blackberry jelly. I also have several bags in the freezer for when blackberry time is done and I need a little blackberry for my morning yogurt. I know it's a simple pleasure but at least it keeps me off the streets and burns some calories (at least until I eat the fruits of my labor).

Elder Flowers, Who Knew Natural Could Be This Dangerous?

How does one find oneself standing on the side of a country road waist deep in grass dressed in a casual denim skirt, t-shirt, and black mary janes? What kind of person stops on their way home from work to pick plants on the roadside in front of the county, God, and everyone?

At the end of last summer an older friend of mine made elderberry jelly. My friend gathered the elderberries from roadside and naturally (at least for me) I was fascinated by the thought of wild elderberries. Something about the phrase “wild elderberry” just sounds so quaint, so not of this century.

I honestly had no idea that elderberries grow here in the US, much less practically in my back yard. In my mind the elderberry was a product of Victorian novels in which Vicars wives in the English countryside plied their husband's parishioners with countless glasses of homemade elderberry wine. (Though, admittedly I once paid an incredibly ridiculous amount of money for a ridiculously small bottle of Echinacea and elderberry syrup at a health food store. I never noticed that it did much for me but its existence should have made me a bit more aware of the elderberry.)

I must acknowledge that when I’m interested in a subject my research and interest tends to verge on the excessive. One might even proclaim that for a brief time I can become obsessive in my focus. This generally goes off after a while and I can move my life on but of course, I do move on with a bit more knowledge tucked into corners of my brain.

Thus it was with elderberries last fall. I read, I researched, I moved on. Then, a few weeks ago I noticed that the elderberry bushes were in blossom.

This is where knowledge can prove to be a dangerous thing. All this knowledge about traditional uses of elder plants and elderberries has been niggling around inside my brain for weeks and it finally drove me out to the roadside shears in hand, for all the world and God to see, so that I might harvest elder blossoms to dry for tea. (Poor Fin has to put up with this kind of behavior all the time. Can you even begin to imagine? I mean I don’t even always understand why I’m compelled to do these appalling things.)

Lest you be encouraged to picture some idyllic countryside moment, I must give you a fuller picture of my adventure.

First, visualize if you will, mosquitoes roughly the size of elephants attacking in full squadron formation, much like the air force of Mother Nature insuring that any enjoyment of the moment be mitigated by sweat inducing swatting, slapping, and arm waving. While the elephant sized skeeters are still in full attack mode the guerilla fighters show up to the party, fire ants out to take down anything that moves with vicious and aggressive tactics. Those soldiers can swarm a mary jane in mere seconds leaving bare ankles and legs victim to foot to foot hopping, leg waving, burning stings. Last, for anyone stubborn enough to stick it out there are the blackberry brambles, sticky vines, and allergy inciting waist high weeds and of course the certainty that somewhere in all that wildness there is most likely a reptile lurking, possibly even a rattler.

It’s truly amazing I made it out with my life much less without a raging attack of West Nile or a venom dripping snake bite.

Obviously, none of this is the recipe for an idyllic afternoon but what can one do in the face of the call of nature? The elder blossoms were blossoming and if they were to be gathered this season it needed to be done. So, gather I did. Next time perhaps I’ll be a bit more prepared, at least mosquito repellent and perhaps skirts aren't appropriate attire for elder flower gathering.

Nonetheless, due to my efforts I currently have a nice little collection of drying elderberry blossoms.

Anyone feel like a cup of tea? Or perhaps you’d like to come for some pancakes. I’ve read they’re nice that way. Anyone up for an elder flower blueberry pancake? I think I could whip us up a few.