light & gather

For my first Mother’s Day, all I wanted to do was be outside.

I had a rough pregnancy where I barely left the house. My son was born in late winter, so by the time it was May, I was ready to burst. What I wanted was simple. I wanted to pick strawberries with my mother and son.

But motherhood happens, and I had to take it in stride. My son was congested. He couldn’t go. And when we got there, the fields had been picked bare.

I was heartbroken, but not devastated. There was something in the strawberry patch that I wanted my son to know something that took me a while to figure out . I knew I’d get another chance, so I bided my time and vowed to try again next year.

Growing up, my mom would have been considered crunchy.

We never had soda in the house, only water, unless it was to make my mom’s pound cake. To my mother, water was the holiest thing on earth next to the Bible. It could get you clean, keep you hydrated, and (in her mind) cure headaches. We didn’t have snacks or chips. Instead, we had oranges, frozen blueberries, and Triscuits.

She would take us to the local farmers market.

It was such a novelty for me because we did our grocery shopping outside. There were people selling food, kids playing, sometimes there’d be music. I loved everything about it, even if I didn’t fully understand it yet.

Fast forward to me being in college and living on my own, trying to figure out how to feed myself on a part-time salary.

Food became an enigma, and grocery shopping had to be effective and efficient, not enjoyable. It was a means to an end, and that was fine for a while.

That changed the first time I started cooking from a cookbook.

I found myself asking questions, talking to the butcher, and noticing ingredients I had never paid attention to before. Food started to take on new meaning, and I wanted to understand it more.

So I went back to farmers markets, and everything started to make sense again.

It all felt new and bright, like I was finally understanding something I had missed before. Now I pick food with pride and intention. I talk to farmers and vendors, asking for recommendations and cooking tips.

That’s when I realized I wanted my son to know food this way something grown, seasonal, and worth paying attention to.

The first time I ate hand-picked strawberries from a local farm, it made sense. If you want good strawberries, you wait until they’re in season. And if you want the best strawberries, you pick them yourself.

And this year, I was finally able to take my son strawberry picking.

He loved them.

Maybe even more than I expected.