friday afternoons and green almonds

every day after school i'd walk home and stop at the grocery store on the way to buy at least one pomegranate.  pomegranates always make me think of my childhood in iran and i re-discovered how i loved them so much and after discovering how awesome it felt to pick one up from a freshly delivered stack at the market, pay so little for it, and come home to sit in our garden, slice it in half, flip the skin backwards to have the seeds fall out like loose teeth (weird analogy i know), sprinkle a little bit of sugar and lemon juice over it, i made this lovely activity a relaxing a routine.

until one day when i went to the store and there were no more pomegranates.  i circled the store about 3 times thinking maybe it was in some new location or something, but no no, there were absolutely no pomegranates.  i felt so cheated and i came home complaining to maggie and being like where in the world did the pomegranates in ramallah go? and she goes, o they're probably out for the season, there'll be giant fresh strawberries soon.

seasons! so used to plastic cellophane wrapped tightly over disposable trays filled with pre-picked amount of fruit in the produce section of chain stores, i completely forgot that in the natural order of things, FRUITS come in SEASONS!  and the pomegranate season sadly is gone :(

however.  there's new things to look forward to.  like the green almonds that have freshly grown into different sizes in our garden.  a month ago, the tree was bare, naked from leaves but dressed in cute miniature white flowers.  the tree shed itself from the flowers and then flourished into a green explosion and now there's these fuzzy coated green fruits, almonds, that have grown that you can pick and pop in your mouth.  they're chewy, tart, with a slightly bitter aftertaste sometimes. somehow they're a familiar taste.


friday afternoons are always pleasant, especially on a day like this with the sun beating down.  and the sun beating down is good for 2 reasons.  one is that it's the perfect day to do laundry, clothes hung outside will actually dry before you go to bed.  and 2 because the sun makes me extremely happy.  on friday afternoons i love hearing the sound outside, which is usually filled with clinks and clanks of the neighbors and the city.  stores, schools and offices are pretty much closed, so everyone is home, taking care of the chores that need to be tended too.  as i hang out my wet clothes to dry, i see my neighbor doing the same, and she gives me a smile and a nod of acknowledgement.

after that i can sit outside on the small dining table that we've shifted outside, skim through a book, and pluck off the green almonds, enjoy the sun and think about nothing.

...except for all the grading that i have to do before school because turns out all of the grades needed to be turned in on thursday, another memo i didnt get because it was posted in arabic in the teacher's room.