Bad Berries

"It's just a little mold"

My mom used to love seasonal fruit. She was a believer in the merits and economy of locally available produce and loved it when the seasons were announced by the arrival of seasonal treats like strawberries, raspberries, and apples. The family really got to indulge, however, when the season wained. The prices fell as the crops were in abundance and the novelty and demand had fallen off. It was then that you might find a basket of strawberries with a few less than perfect specimens. A child of the depression and having grown up in a home where there was always enough but never excess, she knew her way around a half molded berry-- with a knife. "It's just a little mold" she'd say, cutting away the repulsive bit of rot, simultaneously depositing the nasty bit in the scrap pile while its unblemished part would fall into a bowl, soon to be placed on a slice of angel food cake and crowned with Dream Whip.

I was reminded of this yesterday when we were sorting through a box of late season strawberries here at home. The contents were running about 3 to 1, good berries to bad, but still, there were those constituents with the moldy backsides-- half good, half bad. As Tam carefully lifted the offenders from the container and set them aside for the trash I suggested what my mom would do.  (It was one of those moments when you can't quite believe the words are coming from your own mouth-- an action of your mother's, abhorred since childhood, and yet, there it goes, the suggestion to do the very same thing 45 years later. Really? I just suggested you do what??) Needless to say my suggestion fell on deaf ears.  

In recollection, the wisdom of my mother's conservationism was well founded and actually provides an excellent example in life. In this day and age it is especially pertinent: Don't throw out the baby with the bath water. Look for the beauty, not the blemish. 

In a time of growing intolerance it seems more and more we are encouraged to look with greater diligence to find fault, disagreement, and to place blame. Rather than recognizing our blemishes, rather than recognizing the value and wisdom in working to find and utilize the substantial good in every opportunity and situation, we are quick to discard the whole thing. As distasteful as it may seem, we may often be discarding some truly worthy resources.

Fortunately, it seems it has been a characteristic of our successful democratic civilization: Here in the United States we have learned to live together. We have somehow manage to discard many of the blemished parts, keeping the ripe and delicious elements together in that one big serving bowl to be enjoyed by all-- the great melting pot. Not a bad system. Let's hope that old-fashioned sensibility can survive a what seems to be a growing distaste for what we perceive as less than perfect berries.