Blackberries

[Once again, our Internet connection at the hotel has been unavailable for a few days, which explains the long silence.]

It is impossible to state...or to overstate...the number of blackberry bushes on this island. Except for its three small villages, the upper part of Portland is open countryside, and nearly all of it is covered in brambles. They line every road, climb every stone wall, and fill nearly every field.

When we arrived four weeks ago, the petals were just starting to drop from the blossom end to reveal the tiny berries forming below. As weeks have passed, we've watched the tiny fruits grow larger, and now their color is starting to turn from green to pink. A few, the ones growing on warm stone walls especially, have even started to turn black. We've picked a few of these, and they are deliciously sweet and good.

We leave for home on August 23 and expect to return to England by September 20. My dread fear is that blackberry season will come and go during our absence. What a cruel twist of fate that would be! I've already bonded with the image of me standing in one spot and filling a whole bucket full of these fat and juicy beauties. I know how good they're going to taste on our cereal in the morning and on our ice cream at night. I've saved room for them in a freezer that's not even ours yet! You can bet that our first walk once we've returned will be a blackberry check. Like sailors returning from the sea, we'll be hoping that our loved ones have waited for us.