Cherry Clafoutis / Cherry Wars!

Busy weeks call for short stories of this group of quirky individuals I share my life with. Today we discuss cherries. My middle child and I love cherries with an unbridled passion. Unfortunately, cherries aren’t a local crop so we have to buy them in the scant couple weeks they are available. Every season starts The Cherry Wars.

I buy a bag for both of us with a stern warning to leave mine alone. The first bag, I usually get to enjoy at my own pace. As they weeks roll by and they get harder and harder to find the lies and smuggling start.

It starts with the observation that my bag is slowly getting smaller and hers stays the same. Determined that she’s is pulling a bait and switch game, I now buy a second bag and I have a well-planned hiding spot in the vegetable drawer. I approach the kitchen keeping watch for my thieving offspring. Reach down between the leaves of lettuce and celery stalks, wrap my fingers around the distinctive zipped plastic bag and pull up my treasure. In front of my eyes is now a sad bag of pits. This maniacal child had passed over the original half empty bag and consumed my entire stash.

“Evye I told you not to eat my cherries.”
“ No Mom you told me not to eat that bag of cherries.”

She’s got me. I never told her to stay away from the secret bag which becomes not secret at that exact point. She has trapped me between a rock and a hard place. She has won this battle but the war is not over.

Back to the store to feed our cherry addiction. Two fresh bags and very direct threats of the hellfire that will rain down if one cherry from my bag goes missing. Then comes the struggle. See I don’t trust my own kin. I know her she’s like a junkie trying to get a fix when cherries are in the vicinity. The only solution is to walk around like a crazy person with a bag of cherries in my hand. Putting them down and then frantically looking for where I left them before she knows. It never fails, every year my Mom brain takes over and they get left behind somewhere, only to be found after it is too late. I want to think I won this war but it ends with four bags of cherries for her and a half bag for me.

She is the great cherry warrior that can not be defeated. I bow to her battle skills and ability to stay calm when the red juices are flying. You win Cherry Champion, You win.