Strawberry Harvest
Harvest
time for me happened twice a year, and was the culmination of the planting
my father and I had done previously. I was about five years old and he would
take me with him to buy the "sets" (baby strawberry plants). Holding
a large, wet bundle in one arm, I would drop the small plants evenly on
the beds. The wet dress always felt good in the hot sun. My father went
down the row behind me with a trowel, opened a wedge shaped place in the
dirt, stuck the plant in and with his fist firmed the dirt around the new
plant. That steady rhythm was soothing and we turned out a good amount of
work, just the two of us.
Living in what was then touted as the strawberry capital of the world, meant that we picked strawberries as soon as we were big enough. My father didn't demand that we do it and he paid us the same as he did the adult workers, so we willingly went to the field. He was such a nice man he didn't even deduct money for all the berries that went into our tummies instead of the basket. We filled quart baskets with berries, put them into a tray, called a flat, which held six quarts, then took them to the packing shed where neighbor ladies who had hired on for the season washed, sorted and repacked the berries for market. The children of that day and in that place went to "Strawberry School " which meant that in January and February we were out of school to help with the berry picking. Florida is not known for it's harsh winters in the central part of the state, but there was often frost on the bushes when we started picking in the early morning, but soon the sun came out warm and golden. The other pickers chatted among themselves and to this day I can hear the drone of their voices with an occasional burst of laughter. The memories I still have of those times more than sixty years ago are still warm and all good. The gentle sun on your back, the smell of ripe berries, the lovely green smell of the leaves, the mostly happy voices of the adult pickers with occasional bursts of laughter as we picked made life seem perfect for children. In reverie I can still hear those voices.
We always picked very early in the morning and by early afternoon, the small truck my father had would be loaded with the berries and we would head for town. The first dollar I ever made was at about six years old and after excitedly shopping all the stores, came back home with my dollar still in my pocket. It wasn't that there wasn't anything to buy, but that nothing as special to my six year old heart as that dollar bill.
In the early spring, my father and I would go and get the young bell pepper plants and, again, we would plant them using much the same routine as for the strawberries. I would drop, he would plant. For some reason, we children did not harvest the bell peppers, probably because they had to be cut from the plant with a knife so the stem was still on the pepper. We grew, harvested and took to market strawberries, bell peppers and squash.
I truly do believe that being so closely involved in the planting and harvesting of our livelihood and food made my early childhood the idyllic thing it was. Although later years were not so rosy, I have no memories of anything but love, easy work and a sense of importance and confidence all tied in with planting and harvesting. I never had as much fun helping my mother put these foods up for later use as I did out in the fields planting and harvesting.
I've done a lot of planting, harvesting and canning since
that time, but none brings back the memories of harvesting and putting by
on a forty acre Florida farm when I was a cotton-headed little girl.
