Beets

When I was a child I went everywhere I could with my dad. We went to lunch on Saturdays and to Radio Shack and to help out with HAM radio projects, a lot of HAM radio projects. My dad had many friends through his radio club and every year they'd have a potluck. I remember one potluck in the summer at a picnic area by a lake. There were the usual suspects on the buffet line--potato salad, baked beans, fruit, potato chips. And there were beets, not something a picky child would normally try. I remember my mom pointing out an older Ham whose hands were dyed bright burgundy. She quietly pointed out that he had grown the beets and prepared them himself, which is why his hands were red. I decided, or was encouraged, to try the beets to be polite because he had clearly put a lot of time and effort into making them. Lo and behold, I liked them. Pickled beets became one of my favorite salad bar toppings and very occasionally my mom would make fresh beets at home. But I never remember them tasting as good as at that picnic.

Last summer or the summer before I was overjoyed to find fresh beets at the Farmer's Market. But they shriveled up on my window sill before I had a chance to prepare them. I was sad and mad at myself for wasting them. I forgot about beets for a while until I saw them last weekend at the Market, sold by the same father and son who were selling them the last time. They were small, practically bite-sized, but I had to have them. I sent Jason over with money and he got the very last bunch.

This time I cooked them up before they shriveled up completely. I took the first tiny beet out of the cooking water and burned my hands as I peeled it. When I ate it tears came to my eyes. It tasted almost like I remembered, sweet and earthy. But more than that, it tasted like childhood. Like a time when life was uncomplicated and full of possibilities. When something as simple as an old man's red-stained hands could create a memory, a taste, a feeling I don't ever want to forget.