Does anyone else feel conflicted about blueberries? They’ve rolled in and out of my life over the years, with mixed reviews.

Let’s start with 1961. Apparently I just loved a bowl of fresh blueberries and cream. Mom even wrote a poem about it:

For Paula, Who Is Three Tomorrow
(I won’t be able to do it then)

Who likes blueberries, blueberries, blueberries …
all of the children in our house.

For we have small and padded bears
who sit on small and padded chairs;
whose eyes are bright, whose hearts are good,
who’d grow up faster if they could.

Who, on an early birthday morning,
half awake, and half in dream,
come upon a fairy breakfast:
bowls of blueberries and cream.

~ Joan Vayo May 18, 1961

About twice a year during the ’60s, Mom and Dad took us to the International House of Pancakes in Pittsfield after church on Sunday. Oldest brother Harry always ordered Corn Pancakes. Middle brother Dave was all about the Boysenberry Pancakes. (Sorry, Bill, either you were too young for your own order, or it was too mundane a selection for me to remember.)

My choice: Blueberry Pancakes!

I really liked the blueberries that were inside the pancakes. Not so crazy about the thick blueberry syrup, though. I’d scrape that off and pour on some maple syrup. Yum!

… so it was some form of sick karma when my summer job during college was at an IHOP. And the only food product that ever oozed onto my uniform was that thick, gooey blueberry syrup. All three summers, there was never a chance of not scrubbing a blue smear out of my uniform each night – that syrup was awful!

Earlier in the 1970s, we lived in Fairfield, Connecticut, for three years. Our split-level house was brand new. The yard was, too, and it needed constant attention. At some point, we were told the land our house was on used to be part of a pig farm.

Sidenote: Imagine how grossed out the three teenagers in the family were to be assigned summer chores that involved smoothing out the backyard to make it more suitable for growing grass. Yes, we dug up pig bones!

Our house was located on a hill, and Dad wanted to be sure there was something planted on the hillside that wouldn’t wash away in heavy rain.

So he planted blueberry bushes. Lots of them. All needing to be weeded. Oh, how I hated squatting on the side of that hill pulling weeds and trying not to lose my footing. Bees are quite fond of blueberry bushes, so there was that, too.

Poor Dad never got to harvest a single blueberry. Apparently, it takes several years for a plant to mature enough to produce fruit. Here it comes: He found no thrill on Blueberry Hill …

Mom stayed in touch with our former neighbors and they happily reported there were enough blueberries for everyone the summer after we moved to Indiana.

Gary had a bad time with blueberries shortly after we married. His mom made a couple of pies and left them on the counter over at the farm. Gary enjoyed a piece of pie that afternoon and another shortly before milking the cows that evening.

“That pie was good,” he remembers. “Damn good.”

Until, as the milking progressed, something went terribly wrong. Gary was in the barn, gathering up another batch of moo cows when his stomach lurched.

I’ll try to be delicate here, but let’s just say the blueberries opted out of continuing the digestion process. Later, when he came home, Gary could hardly finish telling me about it before dashing off to the bathroom.

To this day, Gary won’t give blueberries a second chance. His mom didn’t get sick after eating a piece of her pie, so we know it was just bad timing and not the fault of the blueberries. But, just as the heart wants what the heart wants, I guess it’s fair to say the stomach don’t want what the stomach don’t want.

And so, no blueberry buckle in this household. No blueberry bushes either. Sometimes, though, Gary is kind enough to pick up a pint from the store and I’ll sprinkle some on my oatmeal for a week or so. With a drizzle of cream, of course, and a smile for my dear mom who took the time to write me a poem for my third birthday.

“For Paula, Who Is Three Tomorrow” © 1961 Joan Vayo. All rights reserved.

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