My mother went into hospital last week with a chest infection. Her last instruction, before being admitted, was for me to place a bet on a horse that ultimately came in 3rd. I can’t blame our fish and tips man for that. It would be petty because he has given us too many winners to complain about a favorite coming in 3rd. Following orders from she who must be obeyed, meant snailing around the Electric Picnic traffic which clogged every road in Portlaoise as I headed bookie-wards. In stalled traffic I had time to notice ripe blackberries in almost every hedgerow and got to thinking.
My initiation into the art of BlackBerry picking featured both my mother and my grandmother; there was also pony racing taking place in the background. I think the whole escapade may have been my grandmother’s idea, it was certainly she who pointed out the fruit laden hedges as we made our way through the turnstiles into the grounds for the event. After doing her duty, by pointing out the bushes, she immediately deserted us for the bookie stands, leaving my siblings and I with no helpful hints on how to grab the fruit without being stung by nettles, impaled on briers, or attacked by man-eating maggots. The maggots seem monstrously huge to this clear sighted ten-year-old.
So, while my mother and my grandmother fluttered, while ponies ran in circles and sweated, and as the smell of fresh manure grew stronger by the minute, I slowly mastered the art of the pull-and-turn to get fruit from the bushes. Too strong and you squish the berries to death, too loose and you drop them.
Soon my fingers were swollen from nettle stings, thorns drew blood from the back of my hand and my neck was sunburned, because sixties mothers did not use sunblock. A warm wind blew around me, race commentaries cut through the cheering crowd and my mouth came alive to the deep, dark taste of warm blackberries.
The truth is that the blackberries scared me more than a little. Maybe it was the maggots I met along the way. These seemed to stick their heads out and squirm in the light of day, like Groundhogs being pulled out of hibernation to give their spring weather forecast. Of course, that’s presupposing I was looking at their heads. I’m not sure that they were not mooning at me, or perhaps they shared a common gene with an ostrich and, not having sand, stuck their heads into the fruit in an attempt to drown themselves, in its juices.
Anyone who has visited my YouTube channel will know that I appear to have an unhealthy obsession with the BlackBerry and even the humble apple at this time of year. If I were being cheeky, I would call what I am doing, ‘mindfulness.’ Though, in truth, for that to be the case, the mind should be empty, not swamped by blackberries. It is a very strange experience, but every year after my fruit picking ordeal, I suffer a sort of post-traumatic stress syndrome. It is as though I have survived an ordeal that may have permanently scarred me. For weeks afterwards, every time I close my eyes, my mind’s eye, my neurological cortex, projects images of wall upon wall of blackberries. Every shape and hue is represented; sometimes moving, sometimes not, always sitting there, behind my eyes, teasingly beyond reach. OK, mindfulness, maybe not. More as though an abundance hypnosis session has gone into nightmare mode.
You know the feeling, the voice in your ear buds may be telling you to concentrate on abundance, there may be soft music playing in the background, or the sound of gentle rainfall, but as the voice encourages you to walk along a stream, somehow your mind strays to images of your own. At this time of the year, as my post-traumatic stress is triggered by bushes weighed down by blackberries, I find my mind strays from the path of suggested images, to imaginings of golden apple syrup or ditches laden with blackberries. And the soundscape in my head changes too, from one of computer-generated pan pipes, to one of hissing winds, of humming wasps, the chirping of nearby birds and lowing of distant cows. As abundance goes, you could do worse, especially as other people’s cliche ideas about money, cars, houses and body tattoos are not always for you.
Driving home, it occurred to me that someday soon I may just be discovered by passing strangers, standing up to my ankles in nettles, arms outstretched, reaching as far as I can for the juiciest berry in the bush. And though they will not see it, I will be hearing ponies hooves race over hard ground, a tannoy screeching in the distance and a huge crowd cheering home a winner. Hopely, they will witness an enormous blackberry fall safely into my hand. Like a fisherman, the berry picker’s life is a solitary one, which is why he will always have tales of the one that got away or was just out of reach; stories that only other pickers would voluntarily listen to, or understand. Oh dear, it seems that I am actively bringing on another bout of post-traumatic stress syndrome, and I haven’t even picked a berry yet. I still remember my grandmother chiding us when she returned with her days winnings, for failing to bring a bag with us when we went picking the berries. We were too full, too tired, too warm, and too dirty to argue. The next time my grandmother stopped at a hedge to teach us a life lesson, it was mushrooms we picked. This time she had the foresight to brine a bag, a Harrods bag if I remember correctly.