Again and again, I rammed the lawnmower against the roots of Mom’s Boysenberry bush, vine, whatever. I hated it!
Mom was an avid gardener. Somewhere she heard of this new hybrid from California. Could she grow it in the upper Midwest?
Mom and I had an agreement. I would be lawn boy if I didn’t have to mess with the gardens. That boysenberry violated all the protocols of our contract. It kept shooting tendrils out into the lawn. It was not my job to carefully weave them back onto the trellis. I mowed them down.
As the growing season progressed, the boysenberry invaded my lawn with greater and greater vigor. My anger boiled each time I mowed. I began violating the border between lawn and garden. My mower went closer and closer to the roots.
By the time those boysenberries matured into eating size, I wanted to kill the whole plant. The raspberry patch behind the garage never gave me this kind of trouble. Raspberries with a bit of sugar and fresh cream! Yummy
Mom’s friends raved over these big hybrid berries. And so the growing season of 1948 ended with the coming of winter.
Next season Mom’s challenge was growing some kind of Oriental poppy.
Rudolph Boysen, a California farmer, used emerging bio-technology to cross blackberries, raspberries and loganberries. He lost his farm in the Depression. A small restaurateur from Orange County rescued a few surviving plants. In the 1940’s, he and his wife leveraged this hi-tech Boysenberry into growing their business. People loved Boysenberry pie.
Time moves on.
‘Knott’s Berry Farm’ is now an International tourist destination and a Multinational food corporation. Last time I looked there were no Boysenberry pies or anything else Boysenberry.
I think about that 1948 Boysenberry War as I watch the growth of the Tea Party.
I can empathize with but not applaud this bitter anger. Family farms with federal subsidy and three thousand fertile acres can’t produce enough income to pay taxes. Factories use tax break profits to replace workers with robots. Main Street puts up shutters as a click of a mouse brings sales tax free purchases from all over the globe to our door.
Time moves on.
One scholar of US Politics observed: Our nation could unite around Peaceful Prosperity. This defined as liberty to spend ‘our own money’ while a benevolent King supplies our needs without limiting our wants!
Ya Sure, when pigs fly! For all my fuss and feathers in 1948, the 1949 Oriental poppy season was successful. My lawn flourished as did Mom’s garden.
