By JEFFERSON WEAVER
Staff writer

Mr. Elliot held our handshake for an extra second or two, and asked why I hadn’t gotten a watermelon yet. He then instructed me to drop by later that afternoon, and that’s how I found myself on a four-wheeler in hundred-degree heat, watching a Jack Russell named Pat ride the bumps better than I ever could.

As Mr. Elliot revved over a bump and Pat swayed gracefully on the handlebars, I tried to imagine life without watermelons. Although I’m usually pretty good at unimaginable hypothetical scenarios, this was one I couldn’t begin to see.

A watermelon, to me, should be an event; I am not one of those folks who can slurp through two or three every week. Rather, the big green product of any version of citrullus lanatus is meant to be treasured.

I have no respect for the mass-produced and sometimes imported grocery store melons that are all water and no taste. There is something undeniably unnatural about a watermelon being ready to eat in May or even late April, as I saw some this year.

We called them “water millions,” when I was growing up, a nod to the time when Papa brought home a watermelon at about three in the morning.

He’d worked all night putting out the newspaper, and a farmer friend had dropped the melon at his office. When Mother went out to greet him at the side door, a tousle-headed three-year-old version of me staggered outside, too, rubbing eyes which grew wide at the unexpected early morning gift.

When the next deadline night was finally over, and Mother again was at the door waiting for Papa, I was there too, sleepily and hopefully asking if Papa had brought me another “water million.”

Whilst he did not have a melon in hand that night, a tradition was born. Melons became millions for the rest of my life.

I cannot recall if that early-morning melon was a Charleston Gray or a Congo, although both grew in those parts back then. Nowadays I think there are a half-a-dozen different varieties specially designed for everything from size to suitability for carving into wedding sculptures.

There are even seedless watermelons, which strike me as a crime against humanity. How can little kids have watermelon-seed spitting contests with no seeds? How can young’uns on bicycles try to find volunteer roadside melons if there are no discarded seeds to sprout along the roadside?

If there are no leftover seeds, how can the budding young farmer know the joy and satisfaction of growing his or her own watermelons from seeds carefully hoarded for a half-year? How can the newly-blossomed green thumb learn about nurturing sprouts in a discarded ice tray, then transplanting them to a likely spot after Mom says it’s okay?

While I know some folks prefer to slice a watermelon through and through, carefully measuring the cuts, I’m more of a slash and pull kind of melon-eater. You start the cut with a kitchen knife, then insert the fingers of both hands into the resultant cut, and pull. The sound and smell of the sopping red heart of a watermelon exposed to the light of day and the hands of a hungry eater is as important to summer as baseball, in my humble opinion.

Since the statute of limitations has undoubtedly run out, and the victim knows about the crime anyway, I must make a confession: I was once part of a watermelon stealing conspiracy. We stole all of one melon, in the dead of night, a day before the start of school.

As the Perseid meteor shower flashed through the sky, and we worried about the flash of light in a kitchen window, we slipped into an unsecured patch and chose a likely victim. We then crept back to our camp (we were supposed to be fishing) and indulged in the sweetest melon imaginable – the purloined kind.

It was a couple of years before I found out that the victim of our petty theft watched our escapade, and actually found it somewhat amusing. I’m sure we amused the policeman who saw a handful of 12-year-olds sneaking down the street in the early morning hours toting a watermelon.

There was no stealing Mr. Elliot’s watermelons the other day; he had so many that I was encouraged to come back when some inevitably became overripe, thus providing a treat for Miss Rhonda’s pet hog. We plucked as many as could be shoved, stuffed, and balanced on his ATV, and headed back to the house.

It would likely take a hundred similar trips to clean out Mr. Elliot’s mile of watermelons. I doubt sincerely we’ll need more than a few extra, and even that load was an embarrassment of riches.

“Anytime you need another one,” Mr. Elliot said, “come on back.”

I think that’s one thing I love about homegrown watermelons; they seem to imbue a sense of generosity in people, even those who are already generous to a fault. It could be that it takes a nice person to grow watermelons, and the act of growing watermelons makes one even nicer.

It could be, of course, I’m just thinking too much.

What I really need to do is take a melon down to the end of the porch, sit down with a kitchen knife and a salt shaker, and enjoy a red-to-the-rind slice of summer.

Watermelons are supposed to be good for the body, but I’m pretty sure they’re even better for the soul.

Weaver is a staff writer at The News Reporter. He may be reached by telephone at 642-4104, ext. 227, or by email at jeffweaver@newsreporter.biz.