Gleaning/Foraging

Ever since I joined the gleaning club (ie: a few of my friends and I go about looking for food to forage), I see food everywhere. I don't just see it as something tasty though. I see the colors hiding in branches and in bushes. It seems miraculous to me that I won't starve, that my basket could always be full. I've made a subconscious sport of looking up and around me for bits of orange, or red, or purple. I've started to recognize the difference between a cherry tree and a plum tree. It has made my life more interesting, pretty, and deliberate. Three things I like.

I love going out on my bike and acting nonchalant while I search neighborhoods for trees with nobody to take care of them. I've started a collection in my sidebag of leaves and unripe fruit so that I can remind my self and go back soon when the pickings are good. So far this year I've collected wild grain and winnowed it with some friends; picked wild currant berries; caught two fish (well, Carl caught them, but I was there); found wild onion roots growing in our very own yard; pruned an abandoned apple orchard; ate plentiful from my garden (it didn't die!); ate local apricots, cherries, and plums; and now I've found a secret road full of neglected fruit-laden trees. There are few things more satisfying than plucking your own dinner from the ground or from a tree. Some might call me a hippie, I prefer pioneer woman. Look outside today and see what you find, there are plump apricots bursting from branches all over Provo right now!

I will probably write about this again, a lot of times. It really spins me, makes me excited, gets my goat, etc... I would love to hear your stories, or advice, or places to go, or if you have fruit trees, or gardens that you want us to come glean!