berry walk

When Zac was a little boy, we used to go out on "berry walks." I'd bring a big plastic bowl, he'd bring my two-cup capacity measuring cup--the one I use every time I bake--and we'd hold hands and head down the road. I can still hear, without much effort at all, the sound of his tiny black rubber boots skipping and hopping on the hard dirt road; can still feel his warm little hand in mine.

Blackberries grow abundantly on and around our farm, so much so that people often hike down our driveway with coffee cans and buckets to pick enough for jam. As a rule, Zac would eat all the berries he picked except half a dozen, which he would proudly dump into my bowl at the conclusion of our walk--his contribution toward the cobbler or pie I'd make after dinner.

All our best talks came during these outings.

"Know what, Mom? God doesn't care if we keep asking him the same stuff over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again. Isn't that great, Mom?"

"Mom, how do we keep going so long? Does God give us a battery?"

"We should make bread, Mom. Know how ya do that? You get some hay and put a little bit of water around it and let it sit a coupla days and it turns into bread."

He'd philosophize about life and best friends and why chocolate would forever taste better than vanilla. Sometimes he'd ask me questions about my childhood.

"Mom, when you were a kid, did people have money or did they just trade for things?"

If a thought entered Zac's mind, it found a way out his little mouth.

One late August afternoon, as we were heading away from a favorite patch with a full bowl, an older couple with two empty buckets walked down the driveway toward us. I smiled and they smiled back. They made a comment about the weather; I responded.

As we turned and took a few steps toward home, Zac reached a little hand up and patted my back. "Good job, Mom--you're making friends."

When I sat down this morning to write this post, I planned on using that comment as a springboard to mention how much I've enjoyed getting to know so many new people through blogging, and how this whole concept is very much like pulling your boots on and taking a walk. You never know who you might bump into out there.

I do believe and think and feel that. I do. But right now I'm still standing in the past, looking down at a tiny boy who thinks I have the answers to all his questions. I don't want to lose this mood. I think I might go look through a few baby books. And later today, if I can find a baggie of berries in the freezer, I believe I'll have to bake up a cobbler.