11_07292011

Bletting of a Nespolo

About:


I wrote this in October of 2008, and is not fiction. At the time I was living in pain, and dealing with a diagnosis of Rheumatoid Arthritis and wondering why, on a slightly larger scale than normal. When I first became sick I lost my job, was in the process of losing my house and my life was thrown up in the air. To make matters worse, a very good friend called me and said, “I was praying for you the other night and the Lord gave me a word for you, “Tell Brian, I’ve got him right where I want him.” Later that same week, as I had gone to my former employer return tools, books and retrieve some personal items, the CEO of the company, a brother, pulled aside into his office. He said, “Brian when I heard you were sick, I was praying for you and the Lord spoke to me and said, “Tell Brian I’ve got him right where I want him.”

A singular gulp of air is what broke threw the listlessness of night, but there was a reason for this gasp. I was awake, but more so than any other day. Quickly I dressed and with care descended the stair. Rheumatoid Arthritis made descending the stair a particular challenge, as fresh morning stiffness is never displaced by motivation alone.

What was this new motivation? Faithfully, the computer began to buzz as if it too was not ready for the hour, but slowly it also executed its own morning routines and came to life. The chair was not comfortable, though its reputation too had become a victim of besetting stiffness.

The first stop Google: the finder of all things worldly and obscure: this is obscure, isn't it? My hopes now rested on what? On this piece of obscurity? Is this the answer to my medical questions? The misdiagnosed cause of pain? A treatment? A Cure? A reason? It was just before that morning breath in which the familiar voice of a familiar man in the familiar dress of hospital whites spoke the words which entered my heart in the space of that first breath, but what did they mean?


"Maybe your house is full of Nespola?"
It sounded medical and was spoken by the man in medical dress; surely it must be. My anticipation fell when the pages were full of all things obscure and not a medical a medical term in sight, but an agricultural one?


Def: Nespolo

-fruit of the Medlar tree
-cultivated in Italy and Spain
-used in recipes for jams, jellies and tarts
-a hard, bitter and acidic fruit which becomes editable only after
       being "bletted:" a process certain fleshy fruits undergo to be made editable

Bletting of a Nespolo:

Ripe Nespola are taken from the tree and spread on some absorbent material such as straw, sackcloth, straw or bran and placed someplace cool and allowed to decay for several weeks. Ideally the fruit is harvested in the fall, immediately following a hard frost, which jumpstarts the bletting process by breaking down the cell wells and spreading decay. Once the process is complete, the flesh will have broken down enough that it can be spooned out of the skin. The taste of the Nespolo is a sticky, mushy substance that has been compared to sweet dates or a dry applesauce with a hint of cinnamon.

Another deep breath, a breath of understanding, entered me and began to sob. I am that Nespolo fruit, bitter and inedible until bletted: until left to a hard frost that bites into my flesh and breaks it down, until bruised, until covered in sackcloth and left to rot in a cold dark place. Oho, that I be loosed from my hardness and bitterness! Oho, that I might bear that hint of cinnamon: that third part of the anointing oil to anoint the utensils of the tabernacle and priests of it (Ex30:22-33). For the familiar doctor who spoke in the final moment of darkness was the Great Physician. He spoke of a cure, a treatment and a remedy; a remedy of the heart and the answer to the aching question of, "Why am I suffering this oho Lord?"

Brian D. McClafferty Oct. 2008