We decided to go blueberry picking.  For the past five years that we’ve spent time in the St. Joseph area we’ve visited the Bumbleberry Acres Farm.  Blueberry picking by comparison to strawberry picking is much to my liking.  The ripened blueberrys grow on bushes which allow a standing upright position while picking the clusters of ripe fruit.  Picking is a pleasant process as the small white bucket fills.  I enjoy the solitude of picking, and also the hum of conversation that occasionally comes from others close but usually not visible, while picking.  Certainly the visitors to the farm are a cross section of multicultural America.  I overhead a conversation between an

older and a younger woman, one individual speaking in the language of her birthplace, and the other responding in English.  I did not know them.  Yet it felt perfect that we picked delicious berries along the same row.

By chance I encountered Brian, the farmer/owner of the farm.  Brian’s projected an spirit of welcome, and we spent a few minutes in conversation.  He related the story of how he came to purchase Bumbleberry Acres Farm from a neighbor who retired.  I enjoyed every detail: how “in a moment of weakness because his wife always wanted to have a farmers market, he and the neighbor worked out a means by which the acerage could be purchased.”  I asked Brian if at this point as a business the farm was “on an even keel?’  He thought for a moment and answered that if he removed the love, the emotional satisfaction they receive from operating the farm, he’d have to say no.  I understood what he meant having operated a small business for many years.

The afternoon developed sunny.  We spent the time on the beach by Lake Michigan.  The young ones busied themselves with swimming, with building sandcastles, with discovering interesting objects thrown up by the currents, and the waves of the great fresh water body, ocean-like Lake Michigan.  I took photos of the sand art created by the kids as we walked the beach.

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