Last of the Reine Claudes

When I told my farm-raised aunt I’d been canning summer vegetables she exclaimed,  “I thought putting up the beans had gone the way of party-line telephones!

A shame she wasn’t on hand when I was facing a bumper crop a few years ago.  Her house maker’s DNA registered everything a country survivor needed, including pie crust recipes that still used solid Crisco.

Alone amidst the plenty, there was no option but to teach myself how to can.  I found it scary (kill the family if you don’t sterilize properly) painful (forging through scalding water to that last jar at the bottom) frustrating (how many did I break or spoil?) and immensely gratifying (months later, a cold evening, whipping out summer tomato sauce for supper.)

Fortunately, I’ve been able to transfer my skills to an eager apprentice.

While John was working with his Bunsen burner outdoor canning kitchen this morning, I whispered gratitude and stole away to the orchard hoping to find a last Reine Claude.

The orchard makes a good refuge, early, before the wasps have flown in for breakfast.  The light is end of summer soft and my heart is breaking a little. Those loved ones who embarked like reinforcements with all their music making and beer-30’s, sunset walks and young muscles are suddenly gone.  I see the swallows lining up on the phone wires, a sign they too are about to leave. 

Melancholy, melancholy, everything seems poised to end.

Then behold, scores of golden teardrops – pears, just starting out.

Of course the plums have mostly vanished since John made jam last week.  But he and the wasps overlooked a few Reine Claudes (green gage plums) my absolute favorite.  A bit larger than the pretty Mirabelles and more interesting than the common Quetsche, there is no balm against sadness like the warm burst of a ripe Reine Claude in your mouth.

Sweetness battles nostalgia as I recall the many summers when we laid vast bed sheets in the orchard, shook the trees and quivered under pelting showers of plums.  For a week, enormous copper vessels dominated the stovetop and the aroma of perpetually cooking fruit permeated the entire house.

Back with my treasures, I see John has finished his canning session and left scrappy posts-its all over the jars, some named “Rats,” for the ratatouille added to the tomato troops.

He’s donned his cement covered overalls. This makes me edgy.  He says it’s time for me to take up the cause again, he’s heading to the farm.  Several stone walls are in desperate condition and the mason has showed him how to repair with old fashioned chaux, a mortar that lets the stone breathe.

And of course the figs are coming in.

I eye the Bunsen burner configuration picturing the next three days living and breathing figs.  Then will come pears.  Then apples… I know it’s time to gather my baskets.

But first, a swallow of summer’s end.