OK, so the oxalis (sour grass) outranks the mustard, space-wise, in Saratoga's Heritage Orchard, where the annual Mustard Walk is scheduled for Sunday, Feb. 9. Big deal. So those yellow blossoms we see in profusion are, in effect, floral imposters when it comes to naming the second annual event, sponsored by the Heritage Preservation Commission and the city of Saratoga. So what? Would French impressionist Claude Monet's celebrated water lily paintings have been any less praised if he had called them cactus? Hardly.

Call it the Mustard Walk or the Sour Grass Go-round—it's an opportunity for Saratogans and their guests to revel in the beauty of one of the few remaining orchards hereabouts, and with some enticing added attractions. The focal point for the event, which will run from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., will be the Warner Hutton House, located at 13777 Fruitvale Ave. in the civic center area. In addition to docent-led walks and free donkey-cart rides for children in the adjacent orchard, at the house there will be demonstrations and displays by local artists, samples of mustard-inspired goodies, and wine-tasting.

I'll have to admit that the idea of a Mustard Walk has a special appeal for me, only I'd be thinking of it in terms of a Mustard Crawl. Some explanation is in order. Until I was 8¹/2 years old, our family, which included my parents and older brother, lived in a house at the end of Marion Avenue (OK, so the map says road; we knew it as avenue). There were orchards—prunes and apricots—bordering two sides of the house, and in late winter and early spring the mustard plants grew thickly and the yellow flowers bloomed in profusion.

The plants grew so thick that my brother and I could go out and, on hands and knees, press the tall stalks to the ground to create trails. We called them "tunnels," and it was great fun to challenge each other's "tracking" skills with the mazes we created.

Before too long, though, the mustard had to be plowed under, and that was another memorable time. I can remember my brother and me trudging along behind the plowman as he guided the horse-drawn moldboard implement and it created furrows in the moist ground. I'm not sure about the technical aspects, but I remember the horse-drawn plow being replaced by a tractor-drawn disc harrow, and that opened another era of childish wonderment.

It was a wheeled, rather than crawler, tractor, and, to me, it became an icon. It was the subject of endless scrawled "portraits" detailing its spiked driving wheels, engine and front wheels. If I was inside the house when the engine's whine could be heard, I was out in a flash to watch the tractor at work. It was, as I say, an icon of childhood.

There were other aspects of the orchard surroundings. Situated as we were, in the midst, blossom time was an event of sheer beauty and permeating fragrance. The harvest brought apricot pickers with their ladders and prune pickers, who toiled on hands and knees. I remember our landlord, Steve Williams, coming to the house to bring my mother a lug box of apricots for canning. (How come when you preserve fruit in jars it's always called "canning"? I suppose because "jarring" would be too, well, jarring.)

I can't think of any more ideal setting for children in their formative years than an orchard. Here one can witness the miracle of growth and the labor that goes with it, the plowing, pruning and picking that brings it all into literal fruition.

There is, of course, no way in which our Heritage Orchard can impart these sensations that go with living in the midst. But simply by being there, it is a tangible reminder of what made this area what it is today.

So come take a walk in the mustard. Did someone say sour grass? That sounds too much like sour grapes.

Incidentally, there are plans under way for setting up an adopt-a-tree program, similar to the commemorative paving stones being installed at the library. If you can't pick prunes or cut apricots, you can still be part of the action.

Meanwhile, if you want to talk the talk, you can walk the walk. Mustard, that is.