feminish

Yesterday’s Jam-Making went as usual.

My hands are stinging from tearing apart the plums by hand and my tongue is burnt from tasting it while it was boiling. I felt sick all afternoon from testing it too often. I didn’t have enough jars, and became miserable when I finally had to evict the aluminium-pan-poisoned Seville orange marmalade that’s been sitting in lovely jars gathering mould since February. Once the jam had cooled I realised it was too sweet and too dark (organic Rapadura ain’t the same as Tate & Lyle) and had to empty out all the jars and try again with extra plums.

As I was tidying up the mess I picked up all the stones and without a second thought chucked them out into the garden, which right now resembles a building site.

Suddenly I felt quite guilty.

I realised that the whole reason the tree has made such a great effort to produce juicy plums for us to take and eat is to ensure its continuation: to give the stones a chance of ending up somewhere they can become a tree.

It’s all very well for me think I can express my gratitude to the tree by capturing its fruit in sugar and jars and not letting it go to waste. But in fact the best way to return the tree’s favour is to treat the stones with respect and put them in places where they’ve got a chance of growing.

I realised that the pile of soil and rubble I had thrown them on will be heading to a landfill in Autumn.

Two hundred years ago a bloke in Britain planted thousands of acorns to ensure there’d be enough oaks for the next generation’s naval ships. Maybe I should plant out hundreds of plum stones to ensure there are enough reines claudes for the next feminist generation’s jam?

Yesterday’s Jam-Making went as usual.

My hands are stinging from tearing apart the plums by hand and my tongue is burnt from tasting it while it was boiling. I felt sick all afternoon from testing it too often. I didn’t have enough jars, and became miserable when I finally had to evict the aluminium-pan-poisoned Seville orange marmalade that’s been sitting in lovely jars gathering mould since February. Once the jam had cooled I realised it was too sweet and too dark (organic Rapadura ain’t the same as Tate & Lyle) and had to empty out all the jars and try again with extra plums.

As I was tidying up the mess I picked up all the stones and without a second thought chucked them out into the garden, which right now resembles a building site.

Suddenly I felt quite guilty.

I realised that the whole reason the tree has made such a great effort to produce juicy plums for us to take and eat is to ensure its continuation: to give the stones a chance of ending up somewhere they can become a tree.

It’s all very well for me think I can express my gratitude to the tree by capturing its fruit in sugar and jars and not letting it go to waste. But in fact the best way to return the tree’s favour is to treat the stones with respect and put them in places where they’ve got a chance of growing.

I realised that the pile of soil and rubble I had thrown them on will be heading to a landfill in Autumn.

Two hundred years ago a bloke in Britain planted thousands of acorns to ensure there’d be enough oaks for the next generation’s naval ships. Maybe I should plant out hundreds of plum stones to ensure there are enough reines claudes for the next feminist generation’s jam?