Counting Down the Days

July 2: A Ritual

 If your raspberry bushes are anything like mine, you pick your raspberries something like this:

You start at one end of a long line of bushes: colander in hand, hat on head, flies buzzing in circles. It is still the early days, so most of the buds are gray-green, while others are only just beginning to blush pink. The bushes are mostly at chest height, and you have to bend down slightly to spot many of the good berries. You peer through the leaves' papery white undersides, searching for telltale flashes of red.

When you spot one, you reach out and cup it gently in your fingers. Sometimes they are soft and velvety and perfect for picking. They are warm from the sun and feel almost alive to your touch. Other times their looks are deceiving—they are red on one side, but still green and hard on the other. There are always berries that are a dusty purple, too. Berries that are ripe, but small and dehydrated. They will be very sour to eat, but you pick them anyway.

you creep down the line of bushes. Some patches are rife with fruit, while others are sparse. The sun beats down on you, dazzling your eyes and warming your hair. Sweat is beading on your forehead and arms. The flies continue to whizz around your head and grass tickles your ankles.

You reach the end of the bushes and you turn, then you begin to work your way back up the line, but this time from the other side. You immediately see berries that you missed before, and you reach out across the thorny canes to grab them. Sometimes you get too daring in this endeavor and light scratches appear your arms. You squat down and you stand up tall. You tilt your head this way and that, squinting. You continue on like this until you suddenly realize you are back where you started, having complete the circuit. You look down at your colander and see a decent number of raspberries, beckoning and smiling invitingly. You walk around the bush one last time, quickly, then begin to move back toward your house.

You do this every day for most of the month of July. As the days go by your colander gets heavier and the picking takes longer. It's hot and often tiring work, but you do it faithfully. As a result, you eat the warm summer sun in handfuls of velvet-red skin and crunchy seeds. You press it into ruby lemonade with a tea strainer. You eat it with honey and whipped cream and a spoon.

The fruits of your labor are divine, but the ritual that goes into the gathering is equally meaningful. It is a meditative practice, communing with the sun and the earth and the rain. It is witnessing the inevitable turning of the world and feeling no fear. It is seeing the days ripen one by one and eventually drop to the ground, but feeling no sadness in their departure. It is experiencing the maturation of the season, and enjoying life while it lasts.