When it comes to figs, it’s woman vs. squirrel

Because I live in California and because we live in a post-pandemic world, I often work at home, outside in our backyard.

It’s a small, modest space — just room for a table and an umbrella pretty much — but being California, it also manages to contain an apple tree, a fig tree and a banana tree.

Our backyard, full of California goodness

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Suzanne Levy

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LAist

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Because I’d grown up in London, my only previous interaction with figs had been eating Fig Newtons (a fair to middling experience) and eating ripe figs picked fresh from a tree as an exchange student in the south of France (a pretty amazing experience).

I’d walk along on a baking-hot, lavender-scented day, as my brain exploded at the sweetness, the slightly warm fig dissolving in my mouth.

So decades later, when I saw there was a fig tree in our backyard, I was astonished. And slightly doubtful. Could a California fig match up to the exquisite French one in my memory? I picked one and ate it. And yes, incredibly, there it was again … sweet, exotic, a gift from nature that’s inexplicably over-generous.

Figs, the inexplicably over-generous gift of nature

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Suzanne Levy

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LAist

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Introducing Mindy

The first year, I watched the young green figs ripen reddish in the sun before baking into their black exterior. It was time. But when I went to pick the plumpest one … another creature had beaten to me to it.

That creature was a squirrel, determined and voracious, who would jump onto the tree like a wrestler jumping from the top turnbuckle into the ring, scrabble through the leaves to find the best fruit, take a tiny bite, realize, no, that was not up to their standards, and throw it dismissively on the floor, before moving on to the next one.

Mindy's aftermath

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Suzanne Levy

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LAist

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Which meant the squirrel — whom we named Mindy, and, yes, there was also a Mork — had way more figs than I did that first year.

Mindy the squirrel's version of sharing

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Suzanne Levy

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LAist

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The second year, I was smarter. I read up on what to do. Cover each fig in a gauze bag! I bought lovely white bags with a satin tie from a wedding site and spent a Sunday placing each fig tenderly in its own covering. It looked a bit ridiculous, like Victorians covering the ankles of their pianos, but I didn’t care. I wanted those figs!

I watched triumphantly as Mindy seemed to lose interest. Or so I thought. A few bags had dropped on to the ground, so I went and looked. And it seemed, Mindy had been having her way with the fruit. There were tiny holes in the gauze. And tiny holes in the figs. Gaah!

A multiplicity of figs

This year, however, we had a bumper crop. I have no idea why — we did nothing but our normal benign neglect (read: my husband waters whatever new plants we’ve put in underneath the tree).

It turns out that while Mindy has a voracious appetite, she has only one tiny stomach — and can only eat so much. And if you have a bumper, bumper crop, something tremendous happens … you have a multiplicity of figs left on your tree! High, low, near, far, black ripe figs every day.

A woman on a mission

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Steve Holtzman

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Courtesy Suzanne Levy

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So one Sunday, I got up early, put on a floppy summer hat, climbed a ladder and picked as many figs as I could find. My Californian harvest: sun-filled, lush and orchard-fresh. (Meantime, I’ve been watching closely and so far the banana tree hasn’t managed even one tiny banana. I am disappointed.)

Preserving nature's bounty

I was ecstatic and took my bounty into the kitchen. Then, after a few days of the family eating them with yogurt, with goat cheese, on salads, on cakes, and still barely making a dent in my pile, I began to realize — oh, this is why all those pioneer women canned constantly during the summer. You use them or you lose them. No Ralphs to pop into back in 1842!

So I looked up canning. Way too much equipment needed. But I could make preserves with lemon juice, sugar and vanilla. My kind of recipe. Way to go! I chopped, I cooked, I stirred, and through a magic of alchemy, after an hour, a rich, slightly goopy jam was dropping off my wooden spoon.

It's Mindy's world. We just live in it.

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Mel Holtzman

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Courtesy Suzanne Levy

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I bought some cute mason jars, filled each one, labeling them “Mindy’s fig preserves” (as a colleague said, it's Mindy's world — we just live in it), and when I was next in the office, handed them out to my co-workers. All lit up with smiles at this unexpected gift.

The managing editor bought crackers and cheese, and we sat munching happily with oohs and ahs all around. It felt so good to be sharing the beneficence of a Southern California summer with others.

When I got back home, I sat in the yard, silently giving thanks to the fig tree for its abundance. And then, as if on a shared psychic hotline, Mindy suddenly appeared, jumping onto a branch.

Mindy's ready for her closeup.

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Suzanne Levy

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LAist

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I picked up my phone to capture the moment, and, I swear, she looked straight at me, as if offering herself for a closeup. I took the picture, and then, she turned her attention to a nearby fig.

That’s fine Mindy. There’s enough for all of us to share.