BUCKING THE SYSTEM: SUMMER TREATS AND MEMORIES OF YOUTH

I loved the outdoors as a little girl.

That was the case even when I wasn't ripping and running with the other banshees in my neighborhood. Sometimes, I'd just spread me a quilt under the shade tree in our backyard, grab a good book and an ice-cold glass of homemade lemonade, and just lay there all day.

Aaaahhhh.

I loved summer most because it meant there was no limit to the things I could do outside. And good thing, because my parents believed every child should spend some time outdoors everyday.

My dad was fun to be with because he was always doing something. Whether we were going fishing, tilling the garden or just hitting golf balls out into the pea field that adjoined our property. He was a lot of fun because he was so active.

And then there was Mom. She didn't really come out until things cooled off, but when she came out -- oh boy.

Mom wasn't so fun to be with because of what she did, but because of what we ate. Her specialty was and still is homemade ice cream and tea cakes, but she could do a whole lot more with summertime fare.

To Mom, my sister and me, summer really meant just one thing: fruit. We are, and probably always will be, fruit-lovers, and everybody knows this area just explodes with fruit in the summer.

We always went to get the U-Pick-'Em strawberries and peaches at our local orchard, but we had a lot of fruit near our home that we could enjoy at anytime.

For example, Coach Spencer had a watermelon patch a stone's throw from our house, and he didn't mind if we raided it now and again.

Mr. Mullins who lived down the road also had a watermelon patch, and unlike us, he could judge a good one just by looking at it. Sometimes he wouldn't even knock on the door: He'd just select one of his best watermelons and leave it on our doorstep, kind of like a summertime Santa Claus.

There was also the field alongside a dirt road about a mile behind our house that had the best blackberry patch in Southeast Missouri.

Mom would lead the way as we carried our small pails and buckets back to that patch, which of course was separated from the road by a shallow ditch filled with weeds, briars, gnats, mosquitoes, snakes and angry birds.

Even so, it was worth every hazard to get to those ripe, juicy berries. I remember standing in that field and eating just as many as we ever harvested.

After we filled our pails (or the other residents got to angry), we'd walk the long mile back to the house, where Mom would then prepared the tastiest blackberry cobbler you ever tasted.

She'd always say it didn't taste as good as Ma Dear's, but I begged to differ. I often found myself finding my grandmother in the cobbler, which meant Mom was really doing something right.

I haven't had any good fruit or any good outside play this summer. During my last visit to my parents' house I noticed the watermelon patches were long gone and the blackberry bushes had been replaced by a wheat field.

That's too bad, because I was kind of looking forward to showing Jerry and PJ some of the things I did as a child while they still liked to be outdoors. I know it won't be too much longer before they forget that love.

All too often we get caught up in our climate-controlled paradises with their cable television and videogames. We forget the simple pleasures that exist in a bite of sun-warmed fruit because everything we eat is refrigerated, pre-rinsed and shrink-wrapped.

Do I hate air conditioning? Oh no, it is my friend, and I keep my friends close.

However, every once in awhile I would like to revisit my youth, with all of its 100 percent, all-natural goodness.

Some things just can't be canned.