Cassie and I tried to make a yearly tradition out of picking beautyberries and jelly making. It started the month after we got married in 2015. I went out with our friend Rodney to do the foraging. Then we all picked the berries off the stems while sitting on the couch of our empty little townhouse apartment. Well, we did for about 20 minutes. After that we realized we had unleashed 
a horde of ants upon our living room, so I had to sit out in the sun to finish off the rest of them. We finally got around to making the jelly (which was another huge mess in itself) and wound up with half-a-dozen mason jars filled with delicious, pretty-pink preserves. Cassie was not happy with the shambles I made of our home. In 2016 we did it again, except I somehow wound up with syrup instead. In 2017 we somehow made something in-between syrup and jelly—a sticky, mess of reddish-pink gloop. If we didn’t space it out between years, I’m pretty sure Cassie would never have gone along with the process because I somehow ruined a part of our house and kitchen each time we made it. But at the very least, she loved visiting the park we got the berries from. And the fact that Julep loved it (if you can’t tell from the picture of her running around us) entrenched it as a tradition!
This September I tried again. There used to be what seemed like hundreds of beautyberry bushes in the park we always went to. This year I was hard-pressed to find even half-a-dozen, and only half of those bushes seemed to have ripened branches. After walking around the place for about an hour, I eventually found enough plants to pick from without feeling like I was robbing the forest or stealing from the birds that eat them too.
With a friend’s help, I got to stripping the berries off the stems and eventually to making the jelly. It’s a weird process. You start with these horrible tasting but bright, pretty beautyberries; you boil them so your left with colorless pulp and a bitter, brown-colored infusion; then after adding the sugar and pectin, you wind up with pinkish-red, tasty jelly. Amazingly, the stuff turned out perfectly this time!
It always amazed me that anyone came up with the idea of making beautyberry jelly in the first place. Nobody would eat the unripened berries because they are toxic. The ripened berries are mealy and not tasty whatsoever. Picking them from the plant leaves your hands dirty and sticky. Boiling them make them looks nasty and makes a tincture that tastes like dirt. But someone still went through all those stages, only to add some sugar and jelling agent at the end to find that it magically becomes a delicious and good-looking food.
And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart.
Galatians 6
Whoever first made preserves from this stuff didn’t grow weary from the trial-and-error process. He knew (or hoped) something good might come with every next step. For the last three years, I had only seemed to get worse at making this sugary stuff. But it finally paid off when I tried again this year!
Still, I’m tempted to quit the work I do with every pang of grief that comes from remembering Cassie—whether jarring jelled juices, serving in the church or typing up application after application to different med schools. But I know that doing that good work at the times when there is the most trying to wear us down is the straightest path to God’s good rewards. As I sort through my intermittent grief, I remember our current circumstance is not an indicator of our future reward. If we continue in doing good despite the feelings telling us not to, we will see bitter, brown water turn into sweet, translucent-pink jam. That much energizes me, and I hope it does you.
P.S.
I struggled to find the berries, nonetheless find a good example for a picture. And the pictures of the process didn’t turn out so well either. But luckily Cassie and I had a friend who could snap a trendy pic of my jelly in action after I shared some with her. If you’re reading this and wondering why you didn’t get to taste any: 1) it wound up being a super small batch because I ran out of sugar, and 2) that friend had some apple pie to share with me. Isn’t it great to have friends who can bake?
