Up in the Back (Part 1)

by Marilyn Yorba Lasker,
Between Times April 2005 page 3-4   

“Up in the back” was a generic term covering different areas of the ranch through my growing up years, but it primarily referred to the area north of Lake Matilda, which was formed by a dam built after I left home in 1950. The route follows our little horse shoe bend to the hilly grazing/ grains/ corn fields beyond, (which was later planted to more groves as water eventually became accessible.) “Up in the back,” a nostalgic phrase familiar to all the “ears” that knew and lived with Albert. “Who wants to go up in the back?” and children and adults and dogs came scrambling to jump into the bed of the pickup for the bouncing, jostling ride up the long and dusty road, which today probably parallels Yorba Ranch Road from Esperanza Road north, (in Yorba Linda, California.)

In my childhood years, before Lake Matilda, the area enclosed by the horseshoe bend, our “Fertile Crescent,” (later also planted in groves,) was part of the dry farm area, that area which was not irrigated but which relied on the seasonal rains, (and perhaps underground springs?) for the necessary watering of crops which would mature in the summertime heat- primarily tomatoes, corn, or the legendary “sweetheart” watermelons. My mouth waters as I remember popping a bite of crisp, red, juicy, sweet, flavorful (well chilled) watermelon into my mouth on a hot day. Heaven! [3]

We did teamwork planting of the watermelons, the seeds of which had been carefully saved- rinsed and dried in strainers- from the season before. We were all watched closely when we rinsed our plates after eating watermelon, for these were the only source of that particular melon. They were totally different in color from all other watermelon seeds, for they were white, not black; the same size, but in color they were like the tiny seeds you now find in seedless melons. The melons themselves were very different looking as well, particularly at that time when there was not the variety there is today. They were light green in color, round shaped with an unusually thin skin, while the meat was a very bright red all the way to the rind, and sweet all the way to the rind; they also had very few seeds compared to other melons. [4]

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