Good Watermelon

I want it with seeds.

But Is It Good Though?

The seedless ones are everywhere now. Easier, neater, nobody’s spitting anything across the table. But I’m not looking for easier. I’m looking for good. Because a good watermelon has seeds. Fruit has seeds. That’s just the truth.

Watermelon is my summer fruit, and I take it seriously. I have bought three or four already this season, each time hoping this is the one.

You do the whole thing — thump it, check the field spot, use your best judgment. And still, it is never guaranteed. I have paid good money for a disappointing watermelon. Trust me, the price is not the promise.

But alas! I found it.

My cousin Taylor graduated.  We celebrated at my aunt’s house.  About twenty of us.  Kids upstairs doing kid things, aunts moving around the kitchen like choreographed routine they’ve been running for years.  Uncles on the couch with the game on. People at the kitchen table talking over each other and laughing.  A whole Black family Saturday in summer.

Aunt Phil needed to make a run to the grocery store. Had a large bill, needed to break it.  I offered to drive because I wanted to move.  No list, no plan.  We walked in and there they were, right at the front of the store; near the basket area, before you even get all the way in the store.  Green, heavy, unbothered.

Aunt Phil pointed.  I did not hesitate.

We brought it back, cut it up, served it out.  Best one of the season—big, juicy, sweet, exactly right.  Everybody ate.  Everybody was pleased.  A whim.  A large bill.  The best watermelon I’ve had all summer.

Unbothered, Actually

The day before I sat down to write this, I went to get a facial.  There was a promotion.  Your choice: anti-aging, calming, tone-balance, or brightening.  The woman looked at my face asked a couple questions and suggested anti-aging.  Then she asked if I had issues with the few wrinkles on my face.

I do not.

I chose a facial.  Afterall,  my skin loves to be taken care of, no complaints there.  But the whole time I kept turning the word over in my head.  Anti-aging.  Like aging is the villain.  Like the goal is to show up to the end of your life with your face completely unchanged, no evidence, no record, nothing to show for the time.

And let’s be clear about who this has always been sold to, and who it was built around.  The anti-aging industry was not created with Black women in mind.  It was built on a white beauty standard, marketed to that standard, and then eventually expanded to include the rest of us as an afterthought.  Meanwhile we’ve been over here  drinking our water, with our shea butter and our “Black don’t crack” for generations.  We already knew.

By the end of the facial, she was telling me how beautiful my skin is—the elasticity, the complexion, all of it.  Beautiful.  And yet, the suggestion was still:  these few wrinkles, though.

The unrealistic search and destruction of self—all in the attempt to be perfect.

I’m going to be 45 years old next week, Lord say the same.  I look good.  Periodt.  I’m saying that plainly because it’s true and because I’ve earned it.  Not by fighting time, but by living in it.

I’ve known loss.  People gone too soon, before they were ready, before anybody was ready.  The idea that getting older is something to mourn.  That the years showing up on your face are a problem.  That feels like a strange thing to complain about when some people didn’t get the years at all.

The wrinkles.  The grays coming in, and honestly they’re kind of doing something.  The body that carried and nursed two children for a year each.  These are not flaws.  These are seeds.  Evidence of a life that is actually producing something.

A seedless watermelon can’t grow anything. We bred the seeds out for convenience.  Looks perfect, lasts longer, less mess. And yet, it cannot produce the next season. It is the end of its own line.

I want my seeds.

I’m not anti-aging.  I’m pro-living.  And next week I’m turning 45 and feeling every bit of it.  In the best way.

The young can walk faster, but the elder knows the road.” — African Proverb

What part of getting older are you actually here for? Drop it in the comments.

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