after I ride the bus to you, we're going to go to work.
We're going to leave the house I grew up in at Five in the morning, so there will be light and we'll have a solid few hours to work without the heat. You do the chainsawing, I'll measure and fasten and stack.
"If you bring your swimtrunks, we can jump in the lake on the way home, and probably stop and get a hamburger in town."
Mom says you're making huckleberry pickers from bits of sheet metal. She wants to paint flowers on the sides and sell them at the craft bazzar. You are not sure about the flowers, or the craft bazzar. You are very sure about the huckleberries.
The next day, we'll leave the house early again. We'll run your device from the stem of the shrub to the top, which pulls the ripe berries off and stores them in the attached bucket. The leaves and green berries remain. We have to be careful about bears and tics.
"and, if you want, we can bring along the rifles or a pistol and stop off at the range. But we don't have to...if you don't like that kind of thing anymore."
"I'd love to, poppa."
"What do you want to shoot?"
"Mmmm, the 30ought6 and the 22 pistol."
"Okay. I'll buy a brick of shells before you come. You need anything else while I'm out?"
"From the Sporting Goods Store? No, I don't think so."
"I'll go tomorrow, call me if you think of something before then."
"Okay."
"Sonie?"
"mm?"
"I'm really glad you're coming. This is going to be fun."
Posted by Sonya at July 23, 2003 04:14 PMI LOVE huckleberries!! When I was quite a bit younger, ma, sis, and I lived in Idaho for a couple years. Just long enough for my mom to finish school. We used to go into Washington on day trips to pick hucleberries.. we never had any fancy sheet metal pickers, just our little purple-blue fingers and empty ice cream buckets. My mom used to tell my sister and I not to eat them as we went along, or we wouldn't have any left for preserves. We did anyway, who could resist? Skipping back to the car, our bellies full and buckets nearly empty, our stained chins and tee shirts gave us away every time. Great memories of Moscow!
Posted by: sammus at July 24, 2003 11:41 AMreading your post, sure brought back some good thoughts. I've picked countless gallons of berries with the old sheet metal picker/comber. always taking the rifles along for some practice prior to bear hunting season, and the 22 for the occasional grouse. sounds just exactly as things were when i was a kid in north idaho.
Posted by: bill at February 16, 2004 07:01 PM