A Heritage of Harvest

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In Appalachia, those tied to the land can smell the harvest long before it arrives on a dusty breeze. The season wafts heavy with a crackling cadence, a whispered promise that the hard work of summer will soon transition to the work of gleaning the fields ahead of the first frost. Shorter daylight hours push us to hurry as the rest of the world is chattering about the pumpkin-spiced goodness fall brings.

Those who depend on the land frequently utter silent prayers, beginning when they break ground in the spring. We ask for a bountiful harvest with every heritage seed our calloused fingers drop into the waiting earth.

Appalachians fiercely believe our heritage is entwined with the seeds we grow. Trying to determine the “best bean” in these mountains will spark a feud faster than spreading Miracle Whip salad dressing on a tomato sandwich; such things just aren’t done. Whether greasy back, turkey craw, Nantahala, or white-half-runner, the variety of bean grown reveals who you are and where you come from.

I’ve worn gloves every time I step foot into the garden, but my hands tell a different story. Dappled with sunspots and permanently dirt-stained, I wonder why I bother with any protective covering. There simply isn’t a glove designed to protect the most valuable tool I own, my hands. Leather is too rough and unmoving, cloth too delicate. Thus far, the best gloves for my paws come with a plastic covering that inches across the fingertips, yet even those become threadbare by August. I yearn to cast aside any barrier that comes between me and the harvest, then I remember the horse nettle plant—also called “bull nettle”—with prickly hairs covering its leaves and sharp barbs on the stem. Horse nettle has a way of hiding under vines and attacking delicate skin, much like a packsaddle concealed in the corn.

The packsaddle, a caterpillar, is Mother Nature’s way of showing us who’s boss. Designed to sting the ever-loving pudding out of you should your skin contact it, many a newcomer has learned to steer clear of unidentified creatures after an encounter with this beauty. The packsaddle is just one of many critters farmers battle in order to bring food to your fork. And battle we have.

This harvest season, Mother Nature seems more displeased than usual. We’ve had drought, wildfires, and angry microclimate outbursts. Mother Nature is quick to remind us we have forgotten the ways of our ancestors.

My parents didn’t worry about global warming or stinging creatures; they worried about preserving enough food for the winter. Harvest season began the moment mother rinsed dust from the dishpan and said, “Larry, go into the garden and pick me a dishpan full of beans.”

Inwardly I groaned. A dishpan full of beans meant I was about to get to work. Brother was, again, conveniently away at football camp, which left me stranded under the hemlock tree with a dishtowel draped across my legs and an empty pan at my feet. Mother laid a double handful of white half-runners in my lap to string and snap. I sullenly watched as Dad decided to disappear behind the house to ‘repair’ something.

The same happened with corn, always a dishpan full, always just me and mother, with discarded strings or corn silks tickling our feet. At that moment, I hated being a girl tasked with “woman’s work.” This was the beginning of me choosing to become a harvester versus a bean breaker.

“Make sure you get all the strings,” Mother said with an expert snap of a bean that was longer than her finger.

The perfect stringing technique takes years to master. It begins with a pinch at the hooked end, then carefully pull the string back to the point where the bloom that formed the bean has faded. Then, snap, snap, snap; three breaks at least. Mother made quick work of a dishpan, which measured approximately one bushel. It was easy to tell which I’d handled. I left the most strings.

Harvest season ended only after the last bean had been canned and the last ear of corn was creamed and frozen.

Decades later, while living in Roswell, Georgia, I met Billy Albertson, one of the last farmers living in the gentrified area. Billy grew up a sharecropper. In his golden years, he lived alone and ran a roadside vegetable stand to supplement his income. Eager to help, I grabbed a bucket and into his garden I went.

Farmer Billy didn’t plant white half runners, for they refused to grow in the oppressive Georgia heat. Instead, he grew zipper peas and pink eye purple hulls, a low-growing bush pea variety that my Appalachian-born pallet had yet to taste. He sold these beauties by the pound until the week his daughter, Janet, paid a visit. Then all sales ceased and the true harvest began. We had a system. I’d pick, she’d “unzip” the pea.

“I find this relaxing,” Janet would say as a pile of pea husks formed on the floor of the carport. Sitting in a folding aluminum chair in front of a fan blowing warm air, I thought I would come undone if I had to unzip a single pea.

Given the choice, I’ll choose to glean a field thick with every imaginable vegetable until I collapse; just please don’t make me string a single bean. Entering the field these days, I have one purpose: pick it clean. Even the overripe vegetables are cherished, for inside the leathered husks lies next year’s seed.

Nothing is wasted on my little strip of country. We’ve worked too hard for this harvest.

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