Blueberry Zen

Early this morning in the dark, I shuffled around making Shelby's car breakfast-to-go. First I poured a little orange juice from concentrate, next to a multivitamin. How could she possibly get enough iron and folic acid in her day otherwise? I scooped out a couple of dollops from the over-sized Old Home Vanilla Yogurt tub, I broke some Georgia pecans Andy's mom sends every Christmas. I grabbed a handful of Craisins left over from summer---in the Sam's club bag that never expires, and then ......my biggest chore was to pick out the sticks from the frozen blueberries.

This was the high point of my day so far.

I know exactly where that bag of frozen blueberries came from. If you want to know that particular secret spot, you'll have to come and pick with us next July. Our sessions are never more than an hour-I slip out of the office when I can--it's a luxury to live in the hotbed of the United States blueberry fields. The fires of five years ago? Exactly what a farmer would have done.

I've read about healthy foods, and I could definitely be more organic, there's so much information about nutritionally better foods taste better and the nasty pesticides on the potato skins: it overwhelms me, makes me feel a little inadequate as a mother. I cook when needed, but it's a task that takes away my energy. When I get off the phone from arguing with the Quetico parks reservation service, there is no zen in cooking supper, not for me. I admire the people who get the zen from that, I am envious of them, I've tried that persona on, and she is not me.

I have read Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. It's interesting, informative, Barbara Kingsolver is a fabulous writer, but you can have my book. 3/4 of the way through I started feeling very snarky towards her smugness about food, mostly guilty I suppose. I thought "I don't need this," and I solved it--I quit reading.

But today, I got the zen from picking the sticks out of the frozen blueberries. Maybe Shelby got a few more anti-oxidants today. Maybe, I've even taken care of my future grandchildren. I'll go ahead and stretch that image, because it makes me even happier.

And I've liked visiting my memories of picking blueberries. They make me feel lucky, they remind me that underneath the mounds of snow lie sleeping blueberry plants, waiting for warmth of July, waiting for Denali and me, and whoever wants to sneak out with us for an hour to pick them.

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