So much for which to be thankful today. Breakfast, Scripture reading, conversation, and prayer with my friend Willie, a delightful time with Linda, helping her watch two very active pre-schoolers for a friend, talk and prayer with a friend in the nursing home, coffee with my friend Harry before ensemble and band rehearsal. Making music is always a wondrous experience. After a wonderful dinner courtesy my wife, I did my first batch of grape juice, six quarts of the stuff.
Thomas Bramwell Welch was seventeen when in 1843 he joined the Wesleyan Methodist church which forbade the use of fermented juice for Communion. As a Wesleyan Christian, he was also involved in the Abolition Movement and participated in the Underground Railroad. In 1864, the General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal church required that unfermented juice be used in Communion. In 1869, Welch perfected a means of pasteurizing the juice, and founded the company that bears his name, which directly contributed to the early growth and prosperity of Westfield, NY, about fifteen miles from my home. The grapes I used for juice tonight came from a vineyard just outside of Westfield.
The juice you can buy in the store is pretty weak and insipid compared to what I canned tonight. Yeah, it's that good. But it's not without its issues. I process it by steaming the grapes in a specially devised canner, and then pouring the juice into the jars. It always makes me nervous holding onto those jars as I pour the boiling hot juice into them. A couple years ago one of the jars I was holding stress shattered as the hot juice filled the jar. How I avoided getting burned, I don't know. Tonight as I poured the juice into one of the jars, I heard a distinct pop. Slowly setting the jar down, I was very grateful it only cracked. I love the juice, but I love my hands just as they are, and offer a prayer of thanksgiving that tomorrow I'll be able to play my bass or bassoon because my fingers didn't get scalded.
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