Out of Season

Red delicious apples and naval oranges were the only fruit we could buy in the winter. No peaches, no apricots, no plums. Once in a while, someone would come back from Hawaii with a pineapple and we would ooh and ahh over the sweet, juicy flesh. To get a piece of fruit out of season was either a treat or an overpriced disappointment.

Now we're spoiled with all produce all the time. We use freighters and import agreements to ship in peaches from Chile, peaches that taste like they we picked as they formed on the branch, peaches so long off the tree by the time they reach our homes that there's not much use calling them peaches, or paying $4 a pound for them.

In some cases, though, the out of season tidbit is a gift, a mouthful of succulence made more sweet by its very rarity.

That's how I'm feeling about the July rain. We're on our second day of drizzle which, in February, would have pulled me down, but today offers a soothing touch. Its odd timing is what makes it good, a rain that cools the earth and quenches its thirst without threat of lingering on and on.