Sometimes, the long view is best. Thinking it would be great to knock back a cold bottle of apple cider five years from now, I’ve laid the foundation for it. If you’ve wandered into these notes and enthusiasms earlier, you might remember the story of the bear, the cider, and the wild apples. If not, you can read the story here. I was so taken with the apples that I used one of the only two spots in my garden in which I could conceivably plant an apple tree, to honour this beautiful apple I found growing wild. I grafted it in the spring — the first time I’ve held a grafting knife in my hands for twenty years, and it was like it had never left. Here is the tree at blossom time, just after the carpentry was finished.

Young Transparent Apple Tree

Bearing hopes for the future.

Well, a couple of months have gone by, and I’m proud to say that that bottle of cider is doing well.

Grafts Doing Well

And do you see half of a transparent apple pie lurking there under the leaves, daughters of those spring blossoms? I wanted to let the mother tree have her say, too, and, besides, who could turn down transparent apple pie? Those lower branches will come off later in the year.

And don’t worry. I love transparents, too. There’s a second one over on the other side of the apricot tree. She is carrying the other half of the pie.

I’m thirsty already.