THIS IS HARDLY T.S. Eliot’s “cruelest of months.” Of all the months, I recall Aprils with the fondest of memories. The air is dry, the days warm, the nights cool. The bright pastel colors of Easter are among us, both in the azaleas and in city folk dress. For every creature, including man, it is the season of courting. Wisteria gives a purple brush stroke to a land awaiting the resurrection celebration. Here comes a new world. In the fields the story is one of work. Fifty years ago, truck farmers were cutting cabbage. The heavily laden carts moved the heads to even heavier laden trucks that drove the produce to railheads. The land both north and south of Charleston smelled of turned earth and raw vegetables. That picturesque era is gone. Urban and suburban sprawl have all but ended the agrarian age.
The canning season has yet to really get under way. Still the few remaining farmers have their hands full tending and gathering crops, including asparagus, peas, beets, broccoli, cabbage, and all the greens still coming up, plus of course, strawberries, now luscious because of warm sunshine.