Berry Priviledged

Our family has two amooda berry trees. They're more commonly known as mulberries in English, but I grew up calling them amooda berries.

     This weekend is predicted to be one of the hottest on record, and this morning I found my grandma picking berries, reaching over the deck and pulling branches from the very tall tree to pick the amooda berries. She marveled at the overabundance of berries we have.

     She is completely right; far too many of them go to waste every year. Most of them are too high to reach and the branches at the top too thin to support a climber, and they fall to the ground and ferment on the lawn because we can't keep up with cleaning them all up most years either.

     Honestly, other times they go to waste because we don't make the time to pick them every day so even some on the lower branches will sometimes go uneaten.

     I love these trees for so many reasons; not only are they beautiful with perfect translucence that creates a mosaic look on sunny days, and not only they produce sweet fruit for us, but they also attract lots of birds including some of my favourites, cedar waxwings. Cedar waxwings love eating fermented berries that remain clinging to the branches, and they engage in little sharing rituals with their flocks and mates, passing berries back ad forth until someone eats it. Their high pitch seeeeeee whistle is one sound that almost always makes me smile, and one I am proud to have recently learned to imitate.

     Some of the taller tree also used to be great for climbing. We would also get way more berries before, though unfortunately all the thick lower branches got chopped off it's much harder to safely pick berries while clinging to the trunk. Perhaps when I recover from my injury I will try again anyway, at least for the view.

     Grandma and I kept picking, or as she noted gently touching berries so that the ripest fall off into the container. She lamented that none of the people we invite over to pick berries ever come to do so. We still share the berries, but we think it would be nice for people to experience picking and tasting them fresh off the tree.

     We never use pesticides, so usually we just go with a quick rinse or even just a bug-check in the moment before popping them in our mouths. The skin on them is extremely thin, and easy to accidentally squish even while picking them so we can't wash them too aggressively or risk mushing them to a pulp.

      I suggested that a lot of people feel they don't have enough time for it. She pointed out that she doesn't really have time for it either, but she makes time. She said her friend also invites peopel to come pick cherries but they never do; she says they want her to pick them for them, and eat it for them too. 

      Grandma had to go inside to work on some alterations for clients, so I continued picking berres below deck where the branches are lowest.

      As I was picking mulberries, tapping them gently with my now grubby, purple-stained fingertips, I would pop squished ones into my mouth. They are so sweet, like little bundles of sugar water, though the black ones have more flavour only at the cost of purple fingernails. (Life hack: use potato skin peelings to gently scrub the bottoms of fingernails). 

      While picking, I imagined how long ago and what someone did to plant the tree. How long it took to grow. I didn't plant this tree, but here I am enjoying its fruits.

      Yes, I had to pick the berries, and yes it is extremely hotday and it is hard work, but I have been given this wonderful opportunity to pick and enjoy them.

      That is what privilege is. 

      I am half European, half southeast Asian, and born in Canada. I have experienced many privileges, and many challenges

      From this perspective, I had a newfound appreciation for my older family members' attitudes; always sharing berries, always inviting people to come and experience picking and eating them fresh.

     I thought of when I was a young kid how lucky I was for my mom to be so involved with my school, and how she would take every opportunity to give something; encouragement, a little treat, an opportunity to do something fun to other kids as well.

      And my Grandma. Just as she always invites people to come pick, and how they both offer baskets of berries for free and tell people who walk by our yard to please don't feel shy to pick from the branches that are hanging over and eat them, we would love to share.

     My mum once considered putting up a sign even welcoming them into our yard to pick a few if they would like, though decided against it for a few reasons, but the deciding factor was the risk that someone may accidentally let our dog out.

     They will plant vineyards and eat their fruitage. It reminded me of the scripture.

     I am extremely privileged to have not only what resources are available to me, but so many family members who from childhood showed by their example how to live with good values. In fact, all of my family members. None of us are perfect, but we have all taught something.

     They will not build for others to inhabit, nor will they plant for others to eat, for the work of their hands my chosen ones will enjoy the the full.

    Everyone will have fair chance to have satisfying work. To plant trees and eat their fruits, and we can all share our fruits together and make a fruit salad.

     I am looking forward to that time.

     In the meantime, I did realize that someone else taller than me would be much more qualified for the job, but I did my best and soon enough I had white and magenta and black mulberries were filling up in my big bowl. Still, thee were so many unpicked, so I figured I'd go get a chair.

      Well would you look at that, someone else already left a chair. All I had to do was free it from entanglement beneath a chopped branch and move it over. Another privilege. 

     It is a privilege to have this tree and to do this work picking amooda berries, and to both enjoy and share its fruits with the birds and anyone who will take it.