peach season

It’s a contradiction, fruit orchards in the desert. But they do exist and the harvest is impressive. A single bite from one of these peaches bathes your wrist in juice.

This is our third peach season, and we realized almost too late that today was our only chance to go pick. So we headed out early to avoid the searing heat and drove 45 minutes to the farm.

In previous years, the kids needed a lot of coaching. Don’t pick the green ones. Or the rotten ones. Or the ones that are on the ground and half-eaten by birds. And there was whining. I’m hot. I’m thirsty. Are we done picking?

This year, their attitudes were as sweet as the peaches themselves. I barely had to work. Miles would disappear under the thick, low canopy of a tree and emerge with an armful. B carefully considered each peach and plucked only the most interesting ones: the twins, the fuzziest, the most colorful. The kids steadily filled our boxes with some of the most gorgeous fruit I’ve seen — 19 pounds in all. 

It was still hot. We were still thirsty. But no one complained. There was an argument over who could carry the most (I won). 

Now we’re back home planning recipes.