The counter top is monitor gray and the half cantaloupe, half honeydew melon, quarter of watermelon, whole papaya, bag of bing cherries dot it with colour and texture. The fruit is lined up as it was taken from the grocery bag and the non-contrived order is perfect for hue succession.
The kitchen door is wide open and there is the feel of the flow of inside/outside; the yearning to be doing this totally outdoors is present, as usual, but the weather is too cool and too windy for comfort so the shelter of the kitchen is appreciated, if resisted.
Plastic wrap is removed from the cut melons: an entire melon makes too much fruit salad for me to consume across several days before it begins to tire and I begin to tire of it. The melons are then washed and the seeds scooped out with a spoon; the seeds put in the sink in the plastic wrap. Then the favourite knife, wide of blade and blunt of end, is used to remove the skin, round and round, as one might peel an apple. The cantaloupe almost makes it to a single strand of peel. But not quite. The peel gets put in the sink; the melon put on the counter, halved and then chunk sliced into pieces; gathered up and dropped into a large white bowl. Next comes the honey dew, same procedure, and its pale ivory/green is layered onto the orange rose of the cantaloupe already in residence. The watermelon quarter is sliced on the rind and the pieces slide into the bowl. The sink is filling with the fruit’s clothing.
Next the papaya is peeled and halved and its pretty seeds spooned away.(A day later I will come across an escaped seed on the floor, pick it up curiously until I identify it; I had thought it was a bead.) The papaya is richer in colour than the cantaloupe, tinged with red. It takes sometime to locate the cherry pitter; memory suggests I have two or three such specialty items but only one is found, the two-finger-and-thumb plunger type and the cherries are too large for it. Instead the knife is used to cut each cherry in half and extract the pit with a fingernail. Hands become stained maroon.
On the radio a man is being interviewed who went on a pilgrimage, a musician man and he tells how he played his music in various churches and was struck by the fact that music had been played thusly for centuries in those places. I am suddenly struck by the fact, gazing at my busy hands, that people have been cutting up fruit for ages and ages and ages as well. What a kindredship!
Now the counter is wiped clean of its fruit juices. Now the peel and seeds are taken from the sink and put in a plastic bag, the top tied shut, the bag slung from my balcony deck in a wide arch toward the compost bin in the garden below; it is quicker (and more fun!) to transport it thusly. And I avoid dripping fruit juice on the kitchen floor, hall floor, stairs, verandah……….
How many cherries to use for the salad and how many to leave for snacks was decided in the usual way: the cherry bowl is put on the counter and the bag of cherries tipped into the bowl. About half fill the bowl and the rest spill out onto the counter. The fallouts are the ones that get washed now and halved and pitted. They dot the top of the fruit salad which is still layered so not yet, truly, a salad. Mixing is needed for that. And mix I do. With my hands. Both hands cup down into the fruit through the layers and draw the different levels up and over one another. Green and orange and red and crimson and rose combine in a tapestry. A can of grapefruit segments is poured on top and a fragrance rises so that I lean down and sniff deeply to try and capture the scent of the other fruit. Mostly I discern grapefruit. The salad is covered by a clear plate and will sit on the counter for a few hours and then be spooned into large yogurt containers and put in the refrigerator. It will be admired in the white bowl with the glass plate cover during its counter sit. More than likely the plate will be lifted more than once and something sampled. Like now. Mmmm. A piece of watermelon soaked in grapefruit juice is quite delicious.