Why My Father Used to Buy Fruits by a Whole Box
In response to Dancing Elephants prompt 23 of 52
Fruits! I grew up with lots of fruits all year round!
Bright red strawberries in the spring were sour and I used to sprinkle sugar. Nowadays, most strawberries are so sweet that no sugar is needed. I guess the process of selective breeding has advanced so much in the last half a century.
Summer started with seedless grapes. Delaware cultivar was the most common. Did you know that people in Japan don’t eat the skin of grapes? And watermelons — my favorite! I could eat watermelons for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
Late summer to fall was fig season, although I didn’t care for it much… My tongue just doesn’t accept that texture. Persimmons followed figs. Our Pomeranian dog liked persimmons better than anyone else in our family. She could not stay still while my mother was pealing the skin.
Then apples and oranges in winter. My hands would turn orange by peeling the skins of so many oranges.
In our family, it was not my mother but my father who brought fruits home. Only four of us were in our family, my father, my mother, my younger brother, and me. But my father would always buy fruits in a whole box from the wholesaler. In a box, there were at least three dozen apples neatly lined up and…
