Last week when I went into the grocery store there were bags and bags of cherries. They were the big red sweet ones. Everyone always enjoyed fresh cherries, but often those around here were out of sight as far as the price was. These were reasonable so I bought a bag to enjoy.

As I sat at my table and ate those gorgeous red orbs, it took me back to other times. Don loved them. We bought some, every season, no matter what the price. It was a treat to have fresh cherries. Fruit was often our dessert. All through the summer we enjoyed melons, peaches, plums, and finally apples. When it was apple time, we headed to an orchard to purchase by the bushel. That was something new for Don. He was used to getting apples at the store. On the other hand, I was used to making applesauce and apple pie filling. I also was used to buying by the bushel and sharing with the children.

I grew up near the orchards. One year while I was attending Fredonia working on my Masters degree, we picked cherries on the Fourth of July. There was no school that day. I took my mother, my daughter, and a friend to pick. When we were taking the girl home, her mother came out to the car. She presented me with a cherry pitter straight from Germany. They were German immigrants. I have used that pitter a lot. It was much better than the paper clip that I used to use.

My first husband enjoyed cherries too. Sometimes the family took off for the orchard to pick our own. My father-in-law loved to pick fruit. The only problem was he would not quit.

Usually when we went picking, we took our lunch and sat by the picnic tables in the orchard that we visited. It was good thing they did not weigh the children first, because they all ate a lot of cherries.

There was a big pond at the orchard where we picked. The children loved to fish in the pond. Grandma always had some pins so she could fashion fishing lines. The children learned to catch the fish and release them.

After lunch, my father-in-law directed us to fill the coolers with fruit as well. We came home with more cherries than we planned. That was an issue because they weighed our containers before we picked. Since the coolers had been full, they were not weighed. They always had to guess at the weight and we paid accordingly.

I used to write for an agricultural weekly paper. They asked me to do a feature on one of the local growers. I contacted the family making arrangements to visit. They answered all of my questions then drove us through the orchard. They invited us to eat supper with them, but we declined because there were cows to be milked at home.

When my granddaughter was a baby, the whole family went cherry picking. I remember taking a break to wheel her in her stroller hoping she would doze off. No luck. She was not a sleeper, but at least she did not fuss.

That year we stopped at Aldrich’s Dairy for our supper. My husband saw a note on the menu that if you sang you got a special discount on your meal so our family sang for our supper that night.

After picking the fruit the next day we had to take care of it. Often, we froze most of our cherries. The sour cherries we picked we had pitted at the orchard. They were ready for the freezer. The sweet ones, the ones called Queen Anne cherries were the best variety to can. They were the more yellow variety. During the winter it was a treat to go to the cellar for a jar of cherries to have with supper.

Most of the big red cherries we enjoyed fresh. As we watched television at night, we emptied a bowl of cherries.

Picking fruit was fun. It was a day away from our own farm and a chance to interact with another farm family.

Ann Swanson writes from her home in Russell, Pa. Contact at hickoryheights1@verizon.net.