Strawberry Fields Forever

A tribute to my favorite berry 🍓

I squat down in the field, the late morning sun warming my back, the birds chirping in the distance while an airplane flies by overhead. The voices of adults and children alike intermittently pierce the air, snippets of conversation reaching my ears as the breeze billows.

A young child, his face smeared with the red residue of strawberries, toddles behind his parents. I overhear his dad telling him to stop eating the berries and to put them into the bucket. He replies, “it’s a pint, Dad, not a bucket!”

I look over and see that he’s right—a teal cardboard pint is indeed in his hands. In that moment, he reminds me of my cousin Luke, who as a little kid corrected my dad on the difference between a fir cone and a pine cone while visiting us in the Seattle area.

Several times, from multiple squatting and bending-over neighbors I hear an expression of how small the berries are. A complaint or an observation, I can’t be sure. It’s likely a mixture. I think to myself, this must be their first time here!, their surprise at the strawberries’ size a dead giveaway of their native strawberry naïveté.

Minutes later, I find the biggest berry I’ve picked yet, big enough to fill a quarter-cup measuring cup. I proudly show it to my partner Pete, daring him to find one bigger. Even I, a seasoned berry picker, can’t resist the allure of a large strawberry.

Every now and then I look up at the horizon, out of need to give my neck a break. It's a clear day now—what started off as an overcast morning has broken up into a sunny afternoon. I see Mt. Hood in the distance straight ahead, and to my left, Mt. Adams. I even catch a glimpse of St. Helens when the angle and light are just right. How lucky am I to call this place home, I think to myself, realizing I’ve never seen the mountains while picking at this farm before. It’s because I’m in a different field of theirs, located across the main road from where I normally pick. It’s late in the strawberry season so they’ve closed their other fields. Here I was, worried about missing my chance to honor my annual tradition, met with a slightly new way to experience things.

It’s the first time Pete has accompanied me on my berry picking tradition. For the past 5 years I’ve gone (6 including this year), most have been solo. There’s been two occasions when a friend has tagged along, but experience has shown me that it can be just as, if not more, nourishing when I do it by myself.

Today though, I am happy to share this with Pete, to witness his first time strawberry picking. I assume we’ll pick my normal half flat (six pints) together, dividing the labor between four hands. He pleasantly surprises me when he says he’ll pick his own half flat. Okay! I exclaim, wondering what we’ll do with twice the berries.

We—or should I say I—tire out after eleven pints, my stomach too hungry and body too achy to pick one more. (Lesson learned: fueling yourself before the harvest is key.)

But I am satisfied, proud of our collective efforts. What’s the plan for these berries?, you might be thinking. I never have one. One year I made jam, most years I make a sweet treat of some kind, every year I end up freezing the majority.

Six year tradition going strong!

Some might think it odd that I have this tradition with no purpose, when it feels like the majority of people who go berry picking are planning for something, usually jam or a pie. But I find freedom in the doing. The purpose, to me, is the picking.

It’s almost a meditative state for me. Every single year when I go, doing my initial squat down into the dirt, beginning my search for the fruits, I have the same thought—damn, this is hard. Seeing how slowly the berries are filling one of my pints, I think what a Herculean task I have in front of me to fill not one, but six! Why do I do this?

I press on. I continue searching for those little suckers, slowly but surely filling my pints. At some point it doesn’t feel hard anymore. This happens every year, without fail. What feels effortful at first becomes trancelike as time passes—I am one with the patch, crouching and angling my head any which way so as to better spot the red rubies within the green forest. I can sense that I’m getting better at this, and I imagine this is how our ancestors must have felt. Cries of delight when they spot the fruit they’re after, like Eve unable to resist the apple.

By now I usually have dirt all over my bottom half, having long ago learned that I needn’t be precious. And I usually have to switch from squatting to kneeling to give my back a break. (Hey, I never said this was easy!) Oftentimes you’ll find me with red stains on my hands too, caused by a combination of eating and picking. They’re my battle scars, evidence of a hard-fought prize. I think for a second that I probably look ridiculous, not unlike the berry-stained children dotting the fields, but I don’t care. I relish in the feeling instead.

We buy our berries and begin the drive home. Pete remarks on feeling it in his body, but he isn’t complaining. I detect what I think is a hint of appreciation, the humbling lesson that comes from hard work. On the way, we stop at Starter Bread for a much-needed breakfast, a fresh strawberry scone the centerpiece of our haul. It tastes like perfection. 🍓

Strawberry treats, clockwise from L to R: Strawberry cake filling most of my plate at a cake picnic, Strawberry Balsamic Pizza, Yogurt, granola, & berries; Scones, Homemade pop tart, and last but not least, jam