It's The Berries!

-Posted by Isaac

"Now that outdoor wood burner I put in last year... it's the berries!"

"That Chillicothe trail you were askin' about, the one we ride about every month down in the hills... it's the berries!"

We have a neighbor who likes to use this expression. When he says, 'It's the berries!,' I gather what he's talking about. He means, of course, it's awesome.  But I, with my high falutin thinking, always kinda dismissed the expression as striving to be overly redneckish.

This season has changed my thinking. Lately I find myself silently saying 'It's the berries!' about every mid-morning as I take the kids out to pick.

It's simply Awesome!

It's The Berries!

 Two years ago Jayne wanted to put in a berry patch. As usual I griped. And as usual she won out. Well, not really. We compromised. She wanted about a half acre of raspberries but we settled with this line in the garden for now.
As is oft to happen, I regret ever dragging my feet. This is wonderful!

We have raspberries galore. Every day a bowl full; we can't eat them fast enough.
Maybe she'll get that half acre after all.
(But you've got to do the marketing, Honey.)

For a change of pace (or I should say, change of taste) I took the kids berry picking where I grew up. My Dad had numerous wild berry patches staked out on the 200 acre cattle farm we called home. I spent many summer hours avoiding thorns, slapping bugs and filling old cut-off milk jugs with juicy, delicious small blackberries.

The cattle farm is now a golf course, but the old berry patches remain to this day!

Personally, I was thrilled to find such a wild abundance. All free for the pickin'.

Although the kids, to my dismay, were not quite as enthused. 

"There's thorns, Daddy!" 

"Ouch! I scratched! Ahhhh!"

"They're too small... I can't reach!"

"I'm itchy... can we go home?"

Spoiled children.

They did nothing but complain. And attract chiggers. Which called for an embarrassing amount of public crotch-scratching over the next few days.
For this I was awarded way too much undeserved blame.
Ugh. 

About the only one who really enjoyed himself was Bridger. 

For one, he ate every bit as fast as I could pick.  It was all just good eatin' to him. I don't think that he realized these berries were different... hunted in the mid-Ohio wilderness. He's still too young to be spoiled rotten by our home grown big fat domesticated thornless berries.

Oh well. 

We'll stick to the garden.