Enjoy the small things

After years of talking about it, my father finally planted a small vegetable garden — a few Roma tomato plants and some native strawberries.

He took tremendous pride in the two planter boxes he made from reclaimed lumber. Each day after work he toiled and watered his small piece of earth with great care.

We hardly paid him any attention when he tried to interest us in the virtues of composting. But bursted into hysterics when he told us pinching back “the suckers” made plants fat.

Our attitudes changed the day he bolted into the kitchen and made a big announcement to the family:

“We have strawberries! Get ready. I’ll be right back!”

We gathered around the kitchen table, wild with anticipation.

My mother washed and dried the largest ceramic bowl she owned. It was old Earthenware; a few chips on the brim with thin pink and blue stripes. Then she instructed one of us to “Get the colander. The big one.”

Small bowls lined in a row where all six kids would get our share of the tastiest, most juicy berries we’d ever eaten. This was Dad’s promise. And he kept his promises.

For weeks we’d heard plans for his bounty’s division: gallons of strawberry jam and night after night of strawberry shortcake for dessert.  Even strawberries and cream — like proper English people, which we were not.

Dad entered the kitchen, with all the suspense of a good mystery. Hands behind his back, he smiled at us.

Why did he make us wait? How could he hold a humongous bucket of strawberries like that? Dad could do anything!

Then from behind his back he slowly brought in front of him…ONE strawberry. The largest, most brilliant colored, perfectly ripened strawberry I’d even seen. It equaled the size of my youngest brother’s fist. I swear it did.

“Isn’t she a beauty?” Dad asked us.

We clapped and agreed it was.

My mother looked around him. For a big bucket. A basket full. Something worthy of her cleaning out the great big bowl.

We’d expected bushels of strawberries yet he was as thrilled by his solo harvest as if it had been a truckload.

“That’s it?” she said.

What may have deflated a weaker man didn’t touch my dad. He sold the story with such excitement that the rest of us joined in without question.

Here’s the thing: He could have eaten it in the garden by himself. Enjoyed the warmth of it, the sweetness all alone, and later told us: It was just one strawberry.

Instead he made a production out of it. Held it up for all of his family to inspect. Expressed thanks to the strawberry as he gently washed and dried the FRUIT of his labor while my mother put away the empty bowl.

Dad placed the strawberry on the cutting board like an offering to the Gods. Then he sharpened his prized fishing knife while we patiently waited. Finally, with great skill he cut the very first berry in EIGHT EQUAL PIECES — one for each kid and one for mom and him.

The teeniest strawberry I’d ever eaten. And the best.

BE F-G AWESOME TODAY!

Original graphic and quote: Stephanie DelTorchio

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