PLUMS AND PRUNES

 

Wear a smile and have friends-plum.

Wear a frown and have wrinkles-prune.

Found this in that little fund raiser cookbook. I chuckled over it, like I was supposed to and then I got to thinking. I get the frown part but, big but. The prune is a much maligned fruit. And the usual comparison is to some one wrinkled, and sour. Somebody you don’t want to be around.

But, maybe prunes are kind of like life. Most of the time you have to look below the surface to see what's really there. The road you end up on may have more potholes than you expected, a lot more. A bounce that would bruise a fresh fruit will be just that for a prune. In fact it may not only bounce it'll roll under the table and you'll have to go look for it. But, it will still be sweet, very sweet, often much sweeter than its smoother sister. . Even the tougher ones can be softened up with a little extra attention. By the way, if that extra attention involves orange juice and a little heat the results are fantastic.

Plums, like most of the summer’s fresh fruits don’t last long. You have to use them, lose them or (for the right ones) turn them into prunes Years ago my dad delivered fruit to the local cannery. He was surprised when the guys on the receiving dock to him that the plums he was hauling in would be going out as Italian prunes.

Under the wrinkles the plum is still there. Grandparents, moms and dads, aunts, uncles and the old codger down the street are a lot like that. I look at my mom. She’s eighty now. She’s a little shorter than she used to be.Her face has become a road map of her life. I look at her wedding picture or pictures from the early years of my parents’ life together. The plum is still there. It’s been through a lot. But, it’s still surprisingly soft and sweet under the wrinkles.