Blueberry Memories: Jocelyn Orr
When I was a little girl of three or four, I remember standing beside my mother. My chubby fingers grasped the floral-print fabric of her long summer dress as she picked berries and plopped them into her basket. All of my childhood experiences of picking berries blend into that one memory.
On this day, I was going berry picking without my mother. It was an odd feeling, but I was excited to pick blueberries for the first time. My mouth watered as I thought about the fresh blueberries. There is something about blueberries that make them an exceptional fruit. The way they explode in your mouth – squirt!
Perhaps our taste buds just know that blueberries are good for us – really good. Blueberries are loaded with powerful antioxidants known as flavonoids. Flavonoids are a great brain food. Research says eating a ¼ cup of blueberries daily can help adults stay sharp and improve their memory. Blueberries also have anthocyanins in them, which prevent tumor growth. Blueberries may be sweet, but they are far from being in the guilty pleasure category.
I picked up three friends in my baby-blue Buick and headed for the Wolfsen Farms in McKinleyville.
“Shoot,” I thought to myself. I left the directions to the organic blueberry farm on the table. “It is a right, left, right,” I said to myself, “but which streets?”
Careful to keep my eyes focused on the road, I turned my head slightly to ask, “Does anyone know where we are going?”
“We are going blueberry picking!” Erin Ryan said behind me.
“No, I know,” I chuckled. “But how do we get there?”
“It’s okay Joce, I’ve been there before,” Jeff Steuben said. I then wondered if he chose the passenger seat because he wanted to sit with me, or if he knew he would end up having to give me directions.
Previous Story: Alabama