Wednesday, February 24, 2021

Two Pomelos

While I opened up the grocery bags, as Duncan brought them in from the car, 

I noticed that one of the large satchels had only two items in it: pomelos, wrapped and decorated as though they would be centerpieces and not as food to be eaten.

I spent a long time looking at the wrapping, wondering what it is about that item that deserved an extra orange netting, a red bow, some pink curly ribbon and 2 artificial leaves.

Pomelos are closely related to grapefruit. Grapefruit can interfere with the medication some people take, so I know that for me, a pomelo is only for looking at.

I watched Rebecca take the skin off, using both hands. 

Her broken arm, though in a simpler cast, doesn't have the same strength that it used to have and so this was mainly a one-handed to job for her.

I was idly doing something else in the kitchen. heard Rebecca say, “That's disappointing. This is one of the varieties that has multiple seeds.”

I asked her why it was popular then, and she said, “Sometimes during Chinese New Year it might be good luck to get more rather than fewer seeds, but I'm getting about 7 to 10 each segment and so bad luck for me, a lot of work for not much flesh.”

I thought she was going to put it in the compost, but she persevered and I saw the pomelo later in the fridge broken in half and in a Tupperware container, one large Tupperware container to hold one pomelo and the other still sits as a decoration on the counter.

Beautiful and maybe even lucky…for someone else.

Arta

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