autumn

apple pies, geese and those subscriptions

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IMG_8780.JPGThe past couple days I drove 800 kilometres (that’s 500 miles for the unconverted) to make pie. From scratch.  From picking the apples to perfecting the pie crust.  A dozen pies.

Why would I do that? It’s the time of year when we balance the ripening of the apples with the hunger of bears fattening up for winter.  The time of year when we harvest and bake and preserve for our own winter fattening up.  IMG_4715.JPG

Why else would I do that? Because it was a time spent in my son’s kitchen side by side as we peeled, cored, sliced and baked for a day.

My friend said it seems like a lot of work when you can just have pie delivered right to your door every week or month if you want.

Yes, in this age of subscription services we CAN have virtually everything delivered to our doors.  On my drive I listened to the radio ads touting subscription services for clothing, razors, dinners and tampons.  Tampons. It said for those times you are in need of a tampon the subscription service will be there.  Really?  So, you find yourself in need of tampons, you check the delivered boxes on your porch and find the dog toy box of things your dog won’t play with, your fridge filter replacement  that you forgot you ordered, a subscription to the oh so handy kitchen sponge replacement.  Oh so handy…. in this case….. maybe? Oh for the olden days when we could just pop into the store and pick up tampons when needed.

As we enjoyed fresh-baked pie and a glass of wine, we watched the Canadian geese “goose stepping” up from the lake to rest on the neighbour’s lawn.  I was fascinated by watching them up close and followed their schedule for a couple of days.  They headed out to the water in the early evening and at noon the next day started coming toward shore in groups of 15 or 20.  After they all gathered, with much honking and noise, they headed up to the lawn. They will do this for a few days until they head off further south. Year after year, they come back.

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Nature’s subscription service for all of us and we didn’t even have to sign up and give a credit card number. Berries and apples every year; bears to watch and wonder at, geese flying in and out again.

Go outside. Smell the fall air.  Listen to the geese. Pick some apples. Make some pie.

 

 

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fall walks

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Fall came in and shoved all the summer pastels to the back of the closet bringing out the golds, the ambers, the deep rust colours. It’s as if Fall knows that gold tone eyeshadow makes blue eyes pop and is using the nearly iridescent gold leaves to show off the dazzling blue sky.

It’s unusually beautiful this year; drier than usual and no storms so far, so the leaves are staying as crisp as the fresh air. Makes for stunning walks and a yard carpeted with gold.

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Mr. Bear was out doing his fall fattening up and climbed over the fence onto my sundeck to chew a hole in the garbage can feasting on remnants of rotisserie chicken. Can’t really blame him for that – I’ve had much the same inclination to chew through a pizza box after catching a whiff of hot bubbling cheese on pepperoni pizza. Still, I don’t want to run into him again so the garbage cans are secured in the pump house for now.

The sound of a chainsaw singing its way through dry pine and the smell of wood smoke drifting by like the faint contrails of a jet off to somewhere….feels like picking the last of the crab apples to make beautiful clear jelly.

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As we rounded the corner on the homeward stretch of our walk, we ran into Young Buck. He said “Hey, how are you?” in quiet deer talk.  He said ” haven’t been around your place since I ate your spring tulips, but I’m out looking for a bedding down place under your trees for winter.  I always liked your yard”.  He and Jasmine stood for a minute looking at each other and I told him to go back into the forest until hunting season is over and he bounded away in disappearing in the trees.

I love fall in the north.