Kathleen Clary Miller has written 300+ columns and stories for periodicals both local and national, and has authored three books. She lives in the woods of the Ninemile Valley, thirty miles west of Missoula.

“Do I dare to eat a peach?” asks the poet T.S. Eliot. Although the poet refers to the challenge of taking a bite out of life as it passes, I confess to asking myself the very same question on a far more rudimentary level: Every late summer when I have my hand wrapped around one, weigh it in my hand, and consider the price I must pay I wonder, Is it worth the risk? Will I be disappointed? I feel certain Eliot was well aware that chancing the bite could go either way. Especially when there are no free samples.

When I spent summers on Balboa Island in Southern California one of my first jobs was to clerk at a corner market complete with a fresh fruit stand on the sidewalk. I could chalk it up to youth or perhaps better times when fruit was not picked too early and frozen for shipment, left then to thaw and in this unnatural process interrupt its natural ripening. All I know is that Jimmy (the produce man) offered the best peaches on God’s earth—and at the close of business I was given whatever remained of that day’s delivery.

I’d walk home, peach juice dripping shamelessly from my chin as I devoured my bounty.

Frustrated now, I linger at the produce section of any market gently rolling the golden orbs in my hand. Will it be dry inside? Is that enough blush on the outside to signal warm orange under the surface that speaks of nectar? Will its juice instead taste like water? Will I ever recover the sweetness of my girlhood? Try farmer’s markets? Doesn’t matter; whenever I gamble I am always disappointed and so in recent years, simply pass by the tempting display with a sigh. Those were the days.

Last week I read an article about a peach grove in Paradise named “Forbidden Fruit Orchard.” They were coming to Missoula to the Farmer’s Market with an early peach crop. I felt that old familiar desire, that spring in my proverbial step that whispers, “You are as young as you think you are.” Dare I?

I got in the car and drove to town on a warm Tuesday evening, made a beeline for the peach display on the sidewalk, only to find it was unpredictable: No slices for tasting.

“The bees will be all over them if we cut them open,” I was told. That was a good sign: Bees don’t buzz to water.

I thought of what T.S. Eliot would say, opened my wallet and bought a small sack without even fondling one first.

“They are naturally clean and unsprayed,” informed the salesgirl who looked like she’d lived on a farm forever (which she has; it’s a family business). So while walking back to the car I reached into the bag, cradled one in my hand, said a quick prayer of thanks for Jimmy, and took a bite.

I’ve always said that if I’d been Eve I never would have nibbled that apple in the Garden of Eden; I am far too obedient.

A Forbidden Fruit Orchard peach, however? Well now, to my utter astonishment, that’s a different story.