Getting Peaches for Father’s Day

My dad lives in Canada. Can I send him fruit?

My first bite breaks it’s soft, not-too-fuzzy skin; the yellow-orange flesh bursts into juicy rivers that run down my chin. If I could smell, this peach would smell like summer. Fortunately, it tastes like heaven.

A few months ago, I came across an Instagram advertisement for The Peach Truck. I am, as my partner will tell you, particularly susceptible to social media marketing schemes, with their bright, graphic designs, bold claims, and beautiful people doing beautiful things. That could be me in those 1000-thread count sheets! So when I came across the orange splash banner of The Peach Truck, boasting ‘the sweetest, juiciest peaches’ you’ve ever had, memories of summer past flowed across my tongue. In particular, there was one peach I got from the farmer’s market in Union Square that has been unmatched, since. Perhaps The Peach Truck was the remedy?

I first received a cookbook and jars of jam. I pored through the cookbook in early spring, dreaming of the cobblers and cakes that I’d make. When at last my box arrived, 12 perfect peaches packed and protected in foam, I immediately took one out, rinsed it off, and took my first bite.

It was a bit hard, and a bit sour. I waited a day, and the next morning put slices of peaches on my overnight oats. Five days later, the peaches have reached their peak ripeness, ready to be eaten. I write this to tell you to bear this in mind. I think that waiting makes them better — it’s perhaps to account for delays in shipping.

As I ate my peaches, I realized that I needed a gift for Father’s Day and stone fruits are perhaps some of his favorites. My dad likes all fruit — we always had fruit for dessert growing up, a bowl of cut up melon, or grapes, or oranges, or berries. I love fruit, too, and I am always shocked to hear of people who don’t. In any case, since I loved these peaches so much, I figured my dad would, too. My dad is notoriously hard to shop for, and believe me, I’ve tried in my thirty-something years to please the man. Ties, shoes, golf balls, electronics that seemed cool but would lay unused in their boxes for years. But this year, I said, this year I would get him fruit!

The only trouble was, I live in the U.S., and he lives in Canada. I realized right away that The Peach Truck won’t ship to Canada. Nor will any other fruit delivery service, for that matter.

Google was, as always in these situations, my first stop. I searched through pages and pages of ‘fruit delivery Toronto Canada’ and ‘fresh peaches Toronto Canada’ and ‘fruit box subscription Toronto Canada’ and did not find a single suitable option. What I did find was that Ontario has its peach season in August, when U-Pick farms are full of visitors. There were plenty of farm produce options, like Harvest Planet, Fruit Suite, or Fresh City Farms. These delivery fresh vegetables or even prepared meals to your home, but my dad, not really being a cook, would not even know what to do with vegetables, which would mean my mom would have to cook everything and I didn’t want to give her extra work. The fruits that these companies would’ve delivered were apples, bananas and oranges. If my parents wanted apples and bananas, they could go to the store and get it themselves. I wanted to give them something special.

Next, I turned to my cousin, my go-to resource for all things Toronto. I spent a few years there growing up, my most of my adult live has been lived elsewhere, so I just don’t know about restaurants and food delivery and what the hip things are. She suggested ordering some amazing barbecue, or a pastry bundle from La Bastille Bakery. Or I could get raw quality steaks (but again, my mom would have to cook them). Wasn’t there a place in Canada that had good peaches, or maybe some cherries, apricots, or plums? Then she told me about her WhatsApp Fruit Group.

“What?”

“My WhatsApp Fruit Group. Every week they send a list of fruits that you can get for wholesale and the price, and you tell them which ones you want and they deliver.”

Wow. Enterprising Chinese folk. The only problem was, they had crates of honey mangoes, melons, and oranges, but no peaches. And the menu varied so often, you really had to tell them right away which ones you want or else they run out.

“There’s also the Go-Go guy,” she texted.

“The what?”

“He’ll go to any grocery store you want and pick up stuff and deliver it to you. You just text him.”

So he’s like a Freelance Instacart or Postmates. Interesting. I could pay him remotely to buy my parents some fruit and deliver it to them in Canada.

I considered this option, but there were two problems: 1) whatever he could get, my parents could drive out and get themselves; and 2) he only took ePayment, whatever that is.

I said, “I have Venmo, ChasePay, and PayPal, will that work?”

No, Canada takes ePayment.

Three days of trying to get my dad a gift, and I began to get frustrated. A little part of me admonished myself, “Why do you live in America, when the rest of your family lives in Canada?” This question never tires of me, and the logistical impossibility of just trying to mail my dad some fruit was wearing on me.

Oh, yeah? I said to my inner critic. Well, why doesn’t Canada just have their own Peach Truck? Or, better yet, why doesn’t The Peach Truck just deliver to Canada? Why are they even a separate country? They are on the same landmass, for gosh sake, it’s not like we’re importing pestilence to Hawaii.

My guilt at being the prodigal daughter appears in many forms.

If Trump wins again, I will be glad that Canada is a separate country to which I can escape, but that is another issue. Because of the pandemic, and customs laws, and the logistics of trying to buy fruit for someone while you’re in a different country, I couldn’t get my dad what I thought he would love for Father’s Day.

I have spent 18 years living in another country, apart from my family. As I get older, I realize it might be important to have nearby relatives when you’re trying to raise kids, or be close to aging parents. Every day I re-examine the path that led me so far away from them, and I agonize over the fact that it is near impossible to go back home again. I have established a life here, a practice here. I have citizenship here, and a home here. People have done crazier things, of course, uproot their entire lives to go back home. I guess when it’s time, it will happen.

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