Cherry Pits

For over a week I've had a craving for cherries. To say that I LOVE cherries is expressing it mildly. Since I was a child and my mother would never BUY cherries I have craved them. My gramma felt as I did she had them periodically - we would share them and she would tell me about how when she was a little girl she would loop the double-stemmed cherries over her ears - like earrings. This I've done a few times as homage to her - the grandmother who would buy me cherries.

One of life's pleasures is reading a book and eating cherries. The best way to do this is horizontal on the couch. If I had a hammack it would be better. I usually put the little bowl for pits and stems on the floor, right next to me, pitching the pits and stems into it while reading and eating.

One day a few summers ago I am pursuing this - a most wonderful past time - when I hear a distinct crunching out of the corner of my ear. This is not an unfamiliar sound because the dogs chaw away on their rawhide bones regularly and create this sound. The grinding and scraping of dog teeth against rawhide is a normal sound. If I had to put a percentage on the amount of attention I was paying I would guess about 11%. I could hear the sound but was not really processing it. Which reminds me, when I reflect on this, that this must be how it is for people with auditory processing disorders - they HEAR what we yammer at them but they don't process it. It's like a dog's teeth scraping on a rawhide bone.

At some point I look over and down at the bowl to determine how much space is left for pits and stems - and discover that it is empty. Where did I put them, I think to myself but then realize in an instant that Duke, my littlest dachshund, has been happily crunching away on every single stem and pit I put in the bowl. Ever since then, I have to be vigilent but that little dog is tenacious. When I fling cherry pits into the compost pile Duke is out of the house like a shot and digging for treasure.

All week the guys selling cherries have been on the street corners. These are the same guys who sell strawberries, flowers, and various statuary. They are ubiquitous. I often wonder if they are related and this is a family business.

"Those cherries sure look good," I say to my commuting partners. They look horrified. Apparently buying fruit from a roadside vendor who keeps extra stock in the trunk of an '81 Oldsmobile just not the same as swiping your card at Albertsons.

Driving to Quartz Hill today took me past another roadside vendor, holding up bags of cherries with a rather pleading look to him. I rationalize that I will buy a bag on my way home - but dang if it doesn't look to me like the same bag when I drive past him again. So I go to Albertsons.

At the market I have to search for the cherries, much like our ancestors had to forage for food. The price is higher than a gallon of gas and I have to rationalize this purchase as worthy because I've had a long and hard week.

The cherries are certainly delicious. But I have to hide them from Duke.