Cider Time
Or, how to start building community
Autumn is harvest time. My family calls it ‘cider time’.
Since he was a young man, Dad has pressed his own apple cider. He started with a barrel, a burlap sack, and a Handyman jack, mounted on a metal frame of his own make. This setup has continued for nearly 50 years; last year, he acquired a giant shutoff wheel, more usually used for irrigation canals. Ever one to iterate, he modified it into a new cider press, easier on his old joints, that can be used by practically anyone. The grinder is two metal cylinders and an old motor he found somewhere; once the apples are cut, cleaned, and pulped, we press them.
For me, once the daylight becomes distant and low; once the leaves turn and wither; once the wild garden, once so fruitful, begins its end — cider time is at hand.
We glean the orchards of friends for apples, searching the overgrown, leaf-riddled grass for ‘grounders’, or picking often neglected neighborhood trees. Some of my oldest memories are of burst milkweed pods at the end of orchard rows, their silky down scattering — of the sweet, spicy scent of spent deciduous leaves crunching underfoot as we search for apples (perhaps bird-pecked or bruised or wormy, but still usable) — of long, bright sunsets as we try to fill one last bucket before heading home, our ancient Ford truck groaning under the weight of our haul.
It’s a time for friends and family. Before Thanksgiving, there’s another meal that we enjoy together: potluck for cider day.
Once, a dear family friend, whose faculties have remained those of a small child, though he’s Dad’s age, stopped by just as we were about to eat. Someone had brought a turkey, Mom made stuffing, and someone else mashed potatoes. “Poi?” He asked, waving his hand as he searched. “Poi?” We finally figured it out: he was asking where the pie was. “No pie,” we told him regretfully, “but here’s some cider — don’t drink too much at once, now; that’s potent stuff!”
Some years, it rains. Some years, it’s almost unbearably hot. Several times, memorably, it’s been snowing at cider time.
Yesterday, there was a crashing thunderstorm. We had just finished cutting all the apples before the torrential downpour. I brought in leeks from the garden just as the first raindrops hit. The hardier souls helped Dad finish pressing beneath a brand new pop-up while the rest came inside to make soup and conversation.
Cider time is a time for community. Our family invites everyone: family, friends, neighbors. Every year, the crowd is a little bit different. Every year, all are welcome.
We take our cue from barn raisings of times past, from work parties: ‘Many hands make light work’, we say, as we talk face-to-face, our hands busy cutting apples, grinding apples, working the press. We eat together, swapping recipes and catching up on the lives we’ve lived since the last time we saw each other. We laugh at old memories and make new ones, looking back, looking forward.
Everyone leaves and we collapse, exhausted, after cleaning up at least some of the mess. Do we really need to do it all one more time this year? We question.
Yes.