Memories of Walnut Farm -
I was born a Gemini and I had the best of two
worlds. We lived in the city and had all the joys offered but when we
went to Walnut Farm we had the joy of country living. Also I was an
only child so I had all the perks that entailed but every weekend and
summer vacations we went to Walnut Farm where I had all the fun,
camaraderie, and the love, especially the love, of a big family. These
are some of the things I remember most.
The farmhouse was a large white one with a
semi-circle front porch where most of the family gathered on hot
summer days. There was a sloping yard and a tennis court where my
uncles and their friends played. Usually there was a huge loud speaker
going with the Red Sox game on. To one side there were two cherry
trees and on the other side was a pole with a wisteria growing up it.
I can't remember ever being denied anything
of any kind of fruit except the Queen Anne cherries that grew on one
of the trees in the front yard. We could only have any cherries that
fell on the ground and could not climb the tree to get any of the
fruit. One day Uncle Sam was up in the tree eating cherries and Mary
said, "How come he can eat the cherries and we can't." And Uncle Sam
said, "I'm only eating the rotten ones." Those were the only things
that we were not allowed to have and I think the tree must have been
Uncle Sam's favorites and Grandma saved them for him. Down in the
back--right up against a hen house was a tree of great big dark red
cherries and with the help of a bushel box we could get right on the
hen house rook and up into the tree and eat all the cherries we could
find.
Another memory is of the blackberries that
grew down along side the run that took the cows from the barn to the
pasture. They were enormous--as big as a man's thumb. It never took
long to fill a pail and my mother made jam and a drink she called
blackberry honey. I've never seen or tasted any blackberries to equal
them.
While we are talking about fruit, Grandma
made the best apple jelly in the world and I've never tasted any like
it since. I'm sure it was the McIntosh apples she used and the stove
she used. She would use the very ripe ones that were pink al the way
thru. She'd wash them and cut them up and put them in a big pan on the
back of the stove and lit it simmer all day. Then she'd pour them into
a sugar sack and let them drain. You couldn't squeeze the bag because
that would make the jelly cloudy. Then she'd boil the juice with sugar
and she had a dark, red jelly just a shade redder than cider. I've
never been able to duplicate either the color or the taste in any
jelly I've made.
On every windowsill in the living room
and kitchen Grandma had geraniums. Every fall she would cut off lots
of slips and root them in Campbell's tomato soup cans. They always
seemed to blossom and blossom. Usually they were bright red and were
very cheerful blooming in winter. She never had any trouble making the
blossom. In the spring she would plant them all outdoors in the
garden, and in the fall start all over again
At every meal there was cheese on the table,
a five pound block of Kraft American Cheese, everyone cut off as much
as they wanted and passed the block on to the next person at the
table. Sometimes in strawberry season, Sunday night's supper was just
strawberry shortcake. But always there was cheese on the table. In
corn season we'd have only corn for Sunday night's supper - always
with the accompanying cheese.
Another dish that Grandma made was cornstarch
pudding. She always made it in strawberry season and when there were
peaches to cut up. She made it in a ceramic dish that had an ear of
corn on the bottom and if it was unmolded the corn would be on the
top, but Grandma never bothered to unmold it. You put a spoonful of
the pudding in a bowl and put either strawberries or peaches or
sometimes fruit jam over it.
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