Flowers bloom again in their season; youth never comes back.
1. The Taste of Midsummer
In midsummer, the sun pours scorching light on the earth. The cicadas go on like white noise; they make a restless mood worse, yet at noon the same steady drone helps me fall into a deeper sleep. Cats, dogs, and people all fear the exposure and hide in the shade, drowsy. Only the green plants look more alive, and the clear river looks more transparent and cool than usual. Summer fruits and vegetables are the most loved. We grow some in the courtyard, planting and picking with the seasons. We cut a tomato that has ripened red in the sun, admire its fullness, and give thanks for the season’s good weather. Then we wash it, and with a slender fruit knife divide it into eight equal pieces, keeping the pulp intact in the middle of each piece, so that its crystal orange looks sour enough without flooding the cutting board. Take a white plate, arrange the pieces neatly, and finish with a spoonful of sugar — a sweet-and-sour that belongs to summer alone.
2. How to Eat in Summer
Summer cannot go without my favorite, watermelon. Crisp-fleshed or sandy-fleshed, I like both — crisp a little more — but either kind must be chilled first. Chilling a watermelon is no trouble; you don’t even need a fridge. We have our own way: draw a bucket of well water from the courtyard — warm in winter, cool in summer — and sink the melon in it. It doesn’t delay anything else; come back for it in an hour or so. To eat a good watermelon you first have to learn to choose one. Choosing a watermelon is like gambling on jade: study the stripes, check whether the stem has withered, and the classic move — pat it twice to judge ripeness. What sound counts as ripe, I still haven’t figured out. The most tense and most anticipated moment is cutting it open. If the melon splits by itself at the first touch of the knife, that is the best melon — like a top student who is proud, not modest at all, showing off its excellence to the fullest. When a watermelon opens in two and faces me belly-up, my happy trouble begins. I used to agonize over eating it with a spoon or cutting it into slices. I no longer have that trouble: alone, I can sit in the air-conditioned room watching variety shows, scooping at an unhurried pace, setting it aside when satisfied and coming back later; with two or more people, we slice it, because eating amid talk and laughter tastes better, and livelier.
3. The Magic of Sunlight and Time
The fierce sun is not entirely useless. Sunlight speeds up time: clothes that need a day to dry in overcast weather need only two or three hours under a clear summer sky, and when a breeze stirs them, they are already soaked with the smell of sunshine. Sunlight also works with soybeans, under the catalysis of time, to brew Grandma’s soybean paste. What I saw every summer since childhood was the sauce jar sitting in the courtyard. The jar is a medium-sized earthenware vat. Washed soybeans go in first; there are steps in between that I never learned; finally it is sealed with green gauze. Forgive me — a little boy in summer is only interested in swimming; why would he ask about these things? The sauce jar’s worst enemy is a sudden shower; one shower can ruin all the work before it. So at any change in the sky, it must be moved to safety — keep our jar unharmed. Sunlight also carries heat into water: the basic principle of solar energy. We didn’t need to buy a solar water heater. We just copied the older generation’s wisdom: lay a sheet of plastic film over a bucket full of water. After the summer sun has exerted itself for a day, by evening the water is nicely warm — time for a shower. I usually saved the last bit of the bucket, lifted it over my head, and tipped it upside down all at once, water from head to toe. Thrilling.
4. The Colors of Leisure
Summer flowers bloom in profusion, and we plant them thick in the courtyard. For colors I want pink and pure white — none of the gaudy ones, like magenta. When they bloom they drift in clusters, and the breeze mixes their scents into the summer air. We cannot be lazy; they need frequent pruning, to save nutrients and to look good. When the scissors cut the branches, some flowers cannot help scattering in the wind — a rain of flowers. Our rudeness, but her romance. I don’t intend to let the fallen petals be ground into mud and dust; we still count on them for compost. The courtyard wall should be painted white, with a sky-blue wooden window set into it. On a lucky, cloudless day, a plane may draw a white trail across the azure sky. Then I will bring out the rattan chair, add a cup of tea, and if I’m in the mood, pick up a book and read with interest. Tired, I look at the sky, the plane, the flowers, the white wall and the blue window; smell the tea, the flowers, and the book. A wind blows, and I might fall asleep right there — a leisurely afternoon, spent.
5. Rain, Plantains, and Poetry
The part of the eaves that juts out should be covered with a layer of yellow thatch, for the rain to run down; plantains should be planted outside the bedroom window, so that on rainy nights I can listen to the rain beating on the plantain leaves. Then I can think my own thoughts — or imagine what the Song-dynasty poets were thinking about when they listened to the same rain on plantains.