thursday is pick up day at the CSA

Sorry to have been away from the blog for so long. It has just been way too hot and humid here for inspiration and reflection! Also I have been recreating, as in participating in recreational activities. Carrie has been home for a short while with friends galore stopping by. Swims in Walden Pond provided relief from the heat. Meanwhile I have to check the schedule daily to see where in the French, Swiss or Italian Alps Eliza is at any moment. She comes back from her job of leading the Tour de Mont Blanc trip next week and then is directly off to Colorado for her fall job. David and I have spent weekends in some really special places in New Hampshire and Maine this summer and tomorrow we hop on the ferry to Martha's Vineyard.

Meanwhile farms and gardens are producing all over town. I'll stick to two. Above are some of the veggies I picked up at the Lindentree CSA last week. Our own front yard garden is full of zinnias, cucumbers, arugula and cherry tomatos. I've made cucumber salad, beets with goat cheese and walnuts and plain old mixed greens in a bowl with a garlicy vinagrette. It's pretty easy to "eat local" at this time of year. I enter the store only to buy exotic fruits; lemons, limes and avocado. Blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, watermelon steal my heart. How delicious is summer fruit?

But picking it in this heat has been almost unbearable. I actually had to give up our share of blueberries last week as the temperature rose to 100 degrees in the field. Even with a hat on, I couldn't stand the intense heat beating down on my head and radiating up from the parched ground. Most of the produce is already picked for us but the flowers and fruit we pick ourselves.

Which makes me think of the people who harvest our food for a living. The farm workers who pick produce not for a few fun hours on the farm but eight hours and longer every day. This work involves bending low in the hot sun. The water truck drives by every few hours if they are lucky enough to have a break. I really think differently about the glorious displays at the farm stand and at Whole Foods. So much of our food is picked by people we rarely see or think about.

Being a member of a CSA and putting in my short four hours a summer of work weeding or picking is a reminder of where my food comes from and most importantly how lucky we are to have people pick it for us. Farm life is romanticized but a lot of it is pure drudgery. At Nine Acre Corner in Concord I see old pick up trucks pulled by the side of the road and a field full of dark skinned men bent over picking. They are doing back breaking work in the hot sun. Perhaps they are glad for the work. I'm sure glad they do it.

Eating with gratitude makes the strawberry taste that much sweeter.