Reverting to the Ways of Our Ancestors

    My plum tree grew from a pit I threw out the widow one year, or maybe it sprouted from compost. At any rate, it chose a fortuitous place to grow, and I have enjoyed its frosty white blossoms every spring, its dark bronze-red leaves during the summer, its scarlet-red leaves in the fall. Usually its fruit is too small to harvest because when a tree grows from the pit of a domesticated plum it reverts to its ancestral form, back to the wild. This year, however, some madness took hold of my plums. They grew as big as ping-pong balls and just as round. They are sweet, juice, and very, very tasty. Last week, with a long hook in my hand, I climbed the plum tree, pulled branches to my perch, and plucked plums into a basket.

    The next day I made plum jam, and that night I took both plums and jam to my host and hostess at a dinner party. They said, "Mmm. How delicious." I blushed with pride, but I'm not sure my blush was deserved. Maybe I can take credit for having made a good jam, but why should I take pride in the plums themselves? I did nothing to make them good. It seems false to feel proud of my plums, apples, cherries, and grapes when I have very little to do with how good they are. They just grow and are good.
    I think this pride comes from the connection we feel with our life force when we grow our own food, a connection we don't have when we buy food from the supermarket. When we grow, harvest, and preserve food, we are connecting with our ancestors, reverting to the wild, as it were. When else do we have that connection in so stark a form? Our water comes out of a faucet, not a spring; our shelter comes ready-made, and we don't tan our leather to make our shoes anymore. 

    But in growing, harvesting, and storing food, we know the elemental connection of our actions to our lives. That tie, I think, is a good thing. As Robinson Jeffers says, "It is time for us to kiss the earth again." It is time for us to remember what is essential in life and to reach back to a time when what was essential was all there was. Harvest may not be as essential to me as it was to my ancestors, for whom it meant a way to keep life and limb together, or even as it was to my grandmother, for whom it was a matter of economics, but not of life or death. For home gardeners today, harvest is more a joy in goodness than a necessity. There is Safeway to take care of our food needs, but life would be sadder without these good, full-flavored fruits from our gardens.
    Maybe in the end I was right that pride is the wrong emotion. Humility seems more justified, humility in the face of plenty, gratitude for the harvest, and thanksgiving for life.

Next week: "The Queen of Hearts, She Made Some Tarts"
Recipe from this post: Plum jam



PLUM JAM

yield: 4 half-pints

Ingredients
4 cups plums
1 3/4 cups honey
Preparation
Wash and pit the plums. Chop finely.
To make
Combine the chopped plums with the honey and let sit for an hour. Bring to a boil over medium heat and boil rapidly for 10 to 15 minutes. Spoon into hot sterilized jars. Seal. Process in a boiling-water bath for 10 minutes.