Tabitha insisted she knew the best spot in all of New York to pick blueberries. It was a beautiful summer day. The sun was shining just enough to warm your face, but not enough to sweat while basking in its glow, so we thought, let’s go and see this magical blueberry land. While my family picked other fruits on farms in the Hudson Valley, we never picked blueberries. We always got them from the stores or farms in plastic or moulded pulp punnets.
Blueberries in a moulded pulp punnet.
My husband, Paul, and I joined Tabitha in her car as she drove away from her home in Rock Hill and deep into the back country of upstate New York. Twenty minutes later, we turned onto a dirt road lined with overarching oak trees, their leaves swaying with a gentle breeze. Tabitha parked in between two young ash trees at the edge of the woods.
We walked about fifty yards into the woods on a one person wide, grass-trodden trail to an open area with few trees. Tabitha wasn’t the only one who knew about this place. Wild blueberry bushes were everywhere. As we each staked out a spot to pick berries, we discussed the best way to make jams and jellies and grabbing handfuls to eat just as they were. But I wanted my grandma to make blueberry pancakes.
Gram made them the right way. She didn’t use disgustingly overly-sweetened syrup with a few blueberries sloppily poured over top a pile of pancakes. Gram stirred multitudes of blueberries into the batter, so much so that it seemed as if there was more blueberry than batter. They were always perfect. I could almost taste them with each berry I plucked from the bush.
Pancakes with the blueberries baked in.
After picking for a while, I glanced around the woods, partly to see how many trees I could identify and partly to ensure we were safe, alone in unfamiliar territory. There were mostly oaks, but also American sycamore, maple, ash and aspen. Aside from the blueberry bushes, there were a few blackcaps, or Rubus occidentalis, but most were not yet ripe.
While the leaves of all the trees were still green, I imagined the colorful spectacle it would turn into once Fall had arrived. I didn’t have to worry about returning once the leaves began to change their colors, I could see it all around me simply by walking out my front door.
Every now and then, a blueberry missed my bucket and managed to fall upwards into my mouth. Wild blueberries are smaller, sweeter, more succulent, tangier, tastier than their grocery store counterparts.
After about 30 minutes of picking, we were no longer alone. A visitor came by and began picking berries, too. He decided the bush next to me was best. He didn’t have a bucket, so he just ate what he picked. A few minutes went by. I think. It felt like a really long time. Paul and Tabitha were somehow unaware of our new blueberry-picking friend.
I elbowed Paul and quietly said, “Look to your left.”
He obliged and asked, “What do we do?”
“Tell Tabitha,” I said.
“There’s a bear next to Irene,” he said.
“Okay,” Tabitha said. I hoped that, since Tabitha spent a lot of time in the woods, she, too, would know what to do without making a fuss. She picked another handful of blueberries, then slowly started walking back to her car. When she was halfway there, I gave Paul my bucket and said, “Go.”
He looked at me as if to say, “What about you?” but I shook my head “no” and he turned and walked away.
The Black Bear of Lake Louise. This is not the bear we encountered.
I tried to be calm. I didn’t want the bear to sense the fear I had, but I wasn’t going to run. Don’t run. Running will get you killed. Surely standing next to a bear could get you killed, too.
I picked a few more blueberries, ate them, then moved to my right. I picked a few more, ate them, then moved to my right. The bear acted as if I wasn’t even there. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. I stopped picking blueberries and methodically moved farther from the bear and closer to the car. When I thought I was far enough away from the bear, I ran as fast as I could toward the car.
Having not thought about stopping once I reached the car, my brain malfunctioned and I slammed into the side of the car as I grabbed the door handle. My brain and body were just a second apart, but they quickly recovered and I opened the door and jumped in. Tabitha, who had already started the car, began to pull away. As she kicked up dirt behind the car, I looked back to see if the bear was chasing us. It was still eating blueberries.
I never did get my blueberry pancakes. My grandma and I ate them straight from bucket.