Summer Waters

Growing up as a kid I used to feel really connected to water as it was something that used to heal me from inside. I would feel whole when swimming in a river or standing under a waterfall - being a Brazilian, I could easily go to places with abundant water, but only during summer break.

My sweetest memory is from what it seems a long time ago. I was seven years old and enjoying vacation with my family at my grandparents' country house. Strangely different from nowadays, the summer used to be somewhat scorching - where one could easily fry eggs on the sidewalk.

I knew that the time to be spent in the swimming pool was limited so, obviously, as a good old kid, every second was precious to me and I did not want to lose a single split of a second by doing something other than swimming and playing with my cousins inside the swimming pool.

"Enjoy your time there, children, because the forecast was stating that today the temperature will rise up to 37°C at least! We don't want you having sunburns so you will have to leave the swimming pool from ten o'clock in the morning to four o'clock in the afternoon" said an aunt.

At ten o'clock we were forced to leave the pool, take a shower and get ready for lunch - obviously with a soundtrack of three children complaining about not feeling hot nor being hungry.

My family is kinda big, to be honest. We are talking about twenty-three human beings (roughly), only on my mother's, side that would gather at the country house every holiday or during long weekends. If the family is big, so it is the variety of dishes on the table by lunch time.

Chicken breast and thighs baked to perfection in a golden brown crunchy skin accompanied with roasted potatoes and rosemary. White rice and rice with corn, peas, carrots and different spices. Three different Brazilian style beans - black, brown and tropeiro. The table infested with infinite possibilities of green leaves, tomatoes, onions and cucumbers for salads. Fruit and fruit juices. Bread. Farofa (a Brazilian recipe of roasted cassava flour - it can be plain or mixed with bacon, raisins, parsley and other spices). Pesto, pasta and pates. And last but not least, Brazilian barbecue made by all the men power of the family, my grandfather.

(That was only the main course.)

The dessert consisted of different flavors of ice cream, homemade cakes, pudding with caramel, pavê (a Brazilian dessert similar to parfait) and fruit salad. After lunch, we kids had to wait for the time dictated by the 'Sacred Law', known in all the extension of this continental country that is Brazil: "One must wait one hour after eating before one can go swimming."

At one o'clock me and my cousins would line up to get our bodies greased with sunscreen only to find ourselves having to wait at least a half-hour more so the sunscreen would "penetrate our skin and not dissolve inside the swimming pool".

This day in particular we had to beg to go swimming. Because of the high temperature, the air above the stone floor around the pool was waving like in those images you see of the desert where the horizon always looks blurred and everything seems like a mirage. After begging to at least three different adults we got our free-pass to swim.

I don't know about you reader, but as a kid I just couldn't stop filling my mouth with water from the pool just to spit everything back again as I was swimming ("Kids..." am I right?). If you stop to think, swimming pools have a lot of chlorine and I can tell you (first-hand!) that this substance has the power to dry out one's mouth.

After that super light lunch [irony intended], swimming without a break and all that heat… I started to get thirsty. However, which kid would stop the make-believe play of being a mermaid and an astronaut floating around in some lake in another planet to do something so boring as to drink water? I just kept swimming until my mouth was glued tight in a sandy-ish feeling – when you are fully aware of the cracks on your lips, the sweat in your forehead and the total absence of liquid in your mouth.

That was when my grandmother put four jugs of watermelon juice on the table with more fruit salad - which had bananas, oranges, papayas, apples, mangos and pineapples mixed with sugar and milk cream in a sweet and cold dessert no one seemed to have enough of. In that moment I felt my body crying in agony so divided I was. A part of me didn’t want to stop playing and another part of me just wanted to chug the juice and eat at least two bowls of fruit salad.

Instead of doing one of the two options I just stood inside the pool, clinging onto the edge, constantly throwing water on the floor so I could put my arms there and stare at the jug. I could feel the sun burning the top of my head, slowly drying my hair as it kept sending drops of sweat through the back of my neck and to the tip of my nose. Droplets of sweat forming around my eyes, my lips and on my cheeks. A cold sweat.

On the other hand, my mind was having a tremendous effort trying not to think about being thirsty. But everywhere had something water related. I find it curious that only when you are dying from thirst (or you have to do a number one in the washroom) that water seems to pop-up in front of you no matter where you look. From the pool I had a clear view of the jug and could see the liquid inside – a vibrant red with tiny little white and black spots of the watermelon seeds.

The jug itself was sweating. The ice inside slowly moving as it was melting in the heat. For some reason, unknown to me until today, I didn’t move. I felt my mouth drying as I watched the jug, the pool, the sprinkler, the adults and teenagers having a water balloon fight and the Tupperware which contained the fruit salad sweating as well.

I started to feel anxious and dizzy, my whole concentration fixated on the watermelon juice jug. The noise of laughter and conversation slowly disappearing as the buzzing of insects and the melody of the cicadas became almost deafening. I could see the drops of water rolling down the jug and all that I could think was how the juice would taste if I drank it. Without noticing it I lifted myself off the pool and slowly walked to the jug, in some kind of trance. The next thing I remember is the naturally sweet flavor of watermelon flooding my mouth and making it water on an uncontrollable droll.

The sweetness woke up my senses again and the cold juice touching my lips sent shivers down my spine, finally making me feel the cold tiles on the kitchen floor and completely stopping the dizziness. I drank a whole jug of juice and had three bowls of fruit salad before remembering to breathe and being caught by my aunt who looked at me in horror and said:

“Jesus Christ, is everything okay? You’re white as a sheet of paper! Have you seen a ghost?” She promptly put her hand on my forehead to check for a fever and took a look at my cracked lips. “Yeah, not a ghost. Just too much time under the sun. No more swimming for you, do you hear me?”

I must admit that I felt somewhat relieved. I nodded and asked her if I could have more juice and fruit salad and after receiving an enthusiastic “Yes, you should!” in return, together with a quick pat on my head - messing up my hair –, I spent the rest of the afternoon drinking watermelon juice and eating fruit salad while laying down on a hammock, swinging and feeling the warm breeze battling the cold air in the shade under the balcony and creating stories inside my head of explorers lost in the desert looking for water.

Ever since that day I must have watermelon during summer time. It became a ritual to get rid of the blazing flames of hell – which people refer to as summer heat – and to enjoy life.

How about you, reader? Have you ever drunk a good watermelon juice in high summer with some fruit salad? If not, try it. I’m sure you won’t regret it!