The Strawberry Moon
I was introduced to Braiding Sweetgrass by a friend I worked with at a flower shop.
She actually told me about the book because of a different chapter—the one about asters and goldenrod, color, and the way bees see the world. I bought a copy that day and immediately began to devour it.
It was everything I loved, and everything I needed in that particular season of my life. Stories woven together with plants and people. A return to the earth. A reminder to pay attention.
And then I came to the strawberries.
In “The Gift of Strawberries,” Robin Wall Kimmerer writes about picking wild strawberries as a child and about what it means to receive something as a gift from the earth.
The strawberries ask for nothing in return.
And yet, because we have received something so generously, we want to give something back.
Reciprocity.
A relationship formed through giving and receiving, gratitude and care.
I loved that idea so much.
And it happened to be nearing the Strawberry Moon.
That year, my children and I were living apart, but they were with me for an extended visit. It was a really hard season for all of us—especially my mama heart—and whenever we were together, I found myself wanting to make a little extra magic out of ordinary things.
So I baked shortcakes.
Nothing elaborate. Just simple shortcakes with fresh strawberries and homemade whipped cream.
That evening, we carried everything outside and sat on the stoop of my little city apartment.
It was warm and humid. The city sounds were loud around us. We ate strawberries and shortcake beneath the full moon while I read the chapter aloud to my children.
And for a little while, I felt transported.
It was just us.
The moon.
And a bowl full of strawberries.
I hadn’t intended to create a tradition.
But the following year, as June approached, my youngest asked me:
“What are we doing for the Strawberry Moon this year?”
And just like that, something we had done once became something we did.
We put on our aprons and made strawberry shortcakes again.
By then we were living somewhere new—a house with a big yard—and instead of city sounds around us, we watched fireflies dance through the grass, cicada song the soundtrack for the evening, while I read the chapter aloud again.
We have celebrated the Strawberry Moon ever since.
Some years have been simple.
This year, we decided to make it extra fancy.
We baked a big strawberry cake. We decorated cookies covered in strawberries and flowers. We set the table and made a celebration of it.
But underneath all of the icing and strawberries and pretty things is still that first evening on the stoop.
I didn’t know then what a treasured tradition it would become.
I didn’t know my children would remember it well enough to ask for it the following year.
And I didn’t know how quickly the years would pass.
Soon they will all be grown, building homes and traditions and lives of their own. And I will have these evenings to hold onto—the city stoop, the fireflies, flour on the counter, strawberries on the table, and all of us gathered beneath the same June moon.
Maybe that is another kind of gift.
Something given freely that makes you want to give something in return.
And I hope that someday, wherever my children find themselves, they will gather the people they love.
I hope they’ll find some red, juicy strawberries.
I hope they’ll sit outside beneath the Strawberry Moon.
And I hope they’ll tell the stories again.
About generosity.
About gratitude.
And about the beautiful things that happen when a gift is answered with another gift.