Last Thursday morning, if you were sitting on a bench on Walnut Street Bridge, sipping a dark roast from Stone Cup and luxuriating like a cat in the sunshine, you might have seen two overgrown kids speed by on bikes. That would have been Larry and I, pedaling our way to St. Elmo on the Chattanooga Riverwalk. Ahh that strong, rhythmic locomotive chugging in your chest as you lean forward and pump your legs up a hill means that you are ALIVE!

As our bikes neared the turnaround point on the walkway, my ever roving eyes caught the sun glistening through green foliage onto small dots of black and red: blackberries!! Pulled by a strong rope of nostalgia, my bike careened off the path and came to a screeching halt in front of the bushes. They were just beginning to ripen, but I found a few shiny black berries to savor. The first one burst in my mouth with a tiny baptism of wild, sharp juice and a crunch of miniscule seeds. I closed my eyes and was transported back half a century to Montezuma, Georgia.

It was the summer of 1968. Our family drove hundreds of miles from our home in Ohio to small town, rural, southern Georgia to visit our paternal grandparents. Except our grandparents’ son wasn’t with us; he drowned the year before. It was just a mother and a carload of kids.

Jonas and Katie Hershberger lived on a dairy farm down a long, sandy driveway. I remember running barefooted in and out that lane, trying to dodge the little knolls of fiery, biting, red ants. Shade from the heat was mostly provided by tall, straight pine trees. Me and my cousins created playhouses with pine straw walls. There was also the occasional mimosa tree, with fern-like fronds of leaves and cotton candy pink flowers.

At the end of the driveway stood a dusty, white Beachy-Amish church house, with german hymnals tucked behind the benches. My grandfather was the bishop of this church, which leaned toward Amish but with a few less restrictions: cars were permitted (but they had to be black), members could modernize their homes with electricity (but no TV or radio), and there was the slightest relaxation of distinctive dress rules, compared to the Amish (distinguishable only to the well trained eye of someone in that subculture). The most common occupation among the congregants was farming. It was a simple, honest, hard working lifestyle, without much personal freedom. The people were friendly and warm.

Well behind the farm buildings were pastures for the cows to graze. There was a large pond in one of them where Grandma loved to fish. At the tender age of six, venturing to the back pastures seemed as exciting and scary as pioneers heading west. We were beckoned by the blackberry bushes, which thrived wild in the pastures. As a rare treat, Grandma and a passel of her grandkids would head out for berry picking, armed with buckets for collecting. It was tricky navigating the electric fences, shockingly meant to keep the cows inside. We always had to be sure that the mean bull was not in that pasture, because we had heard enough stories of mortal damage inflicted by those muscular animals with nasal rings. And we kept a sharp eye out for cottonmouths and rattlesnakes, which also frequented the area.

Have you noticed how the taste of something from childhood reaches right into the well of your heart and draws out a bucket of memories? When I ate that first blackberry last Thursday on our bike ride, I was six years old again. I felt the sun beating down until sweat trickled down my back, underneath my dress. Mosquitoes, chiggers, and the barbs on the berry branches had left my limbs battled scarred. My stomach ached pleasantly with fullness from my picking style: “berries in the bucket, berries in my mouth, berries in the bucket, berries in my mouth.” The dark staining on my fingers and circling my mouth was further proof that I was a “sampler.” I could hear the teasing and banter among the cousins as we picked. The soles of my feet were black with dirt. And I felt the warmth of joy and belonging: hot and pure and simple as the sun overhead.

After a day of blackberry picking, Grandma always served blackberry soup for dinner. You’ll never find the recipe for this delicacy on a fancy food blog. Even though I was only a first grader, I can tell you how to prepare it. Cut slices of homemade white bread into small cubes, about one inch square. Wash the berries and pick through them for any leaves or debris. Thinly slice a banana. To assemble each individual serving, place a handful of bread cubes, a handful of blackberries and a few banana slices into a bowl; pour some milk over everything. Everyone gets a bowl and sits down at the table and bows their head for prayer. After the “Amen,” eat it quickly before the bread gets too wet.

Honestly I’m not even sure that I’d want to eat blackberry soup today. I just might pass on the soggy bread, fruit and milk that we called “supper.” I sure do feel nostalgic though to have this memory thread woven into the tapestry of my childhood. By the way, if you can find melamine bowls like my Grandma used to serve her soup in, I might eat it for old times sake.