Summery Blackberries

I went blackberry picking at a small Virginia farm a few weekends ago with my dear friend Missy. Since her GPS thought it knew better than both of us (let’s be honest, it probably does, but this was an exception) we ended up winding through some small rural towns on the bright side of a rainstorm. It was truly charming countryside and made me remember that I like to live in Virginia. Sometimes I forget how beautiful and rural much of the state is. The little towns were founded in years with four digits that start with 16s and 17s and contain stone and brick buildings along two lane highways. It was all green and summery and fresh. A lot of tall church spires and tilting tombstones and whitewashed brick. Signs hanging from wrought iron outside shop doors. I wouldn’t have been terribly surprised to see an aproned woman in a pilgrim dress and bun in her hair poke her head through a window wielding a rolling pin.

Missy and I had a fabulous time, as we always do when I can manage to get away from the kids and she can manage to get away from her fast-paced job on Capitol Hill and we can be real people again. She’s from Idaho and has lived in Virginia/DC since two years before I moved here, and two years with me, and she gets it. She gets me and Idaho and Virginia and coming to terms with living on the East Coast instead of the Wild West because we married guys here. And I get her. 

All that background simply to say that it is good to get away to a pretty place with a good old friend and that blackberries are tasty, plump, summery treats that I adore. They also make delicious cobblers.

Blackberry inspector approves the berries

Cobbler-makin' 

Partially-eaten cobbler