A Peach Is Not Just a Peach (TinyLetter Archive)

Dear friends,

Something that I think is maybe a little strange about myself is that I fantasize continually but often expect the worst. I'm skeptical, but I believe deeply in following my intuition. And when I am starting a relationship, I question everything, trying to assess if my feelings are real, whether I like this actual person or just the idea of this person--whether the anxiety I'm feeling is in response to legitimate warning signs or just regular anxiety. And so those early days with a new partner, they tend to involve a lot of me telling myself to be open-minded and not read too much into things. My most recent relationship had a couple of moments which, looking back now, contained clear red flags. Hindsight and all that. But one of the things that gave me pause was when he told me that he didn't like peaches.

At first I thought he was joking as he made a gagging sound and became incensed by my peachy affection, but no, he truly was disgusted by them. I remember telling him that for three or four summers now, I'd bought a giant box of peaches, and they would cover my entire counter when I laid them out to ripen. He was aghast. That first summer, 2017 I think, the dear Chinese woman who owns a local vegan bakery and cafe (Half Peach Cafe, incidentally) posted on instagram that she had these big boxes of peaches that she was selling for a local farmer. He hadn't been well and didn't have the energy to go to market with them himself, so Sue was trying to help out by appealing to her customers. It was the perfect way to get my first box, and I just kept on from there. So in that season, I gorge myself on peaches. I eat two or three a day--on their own, on sourdough toast with almond butter, sliced in an arugula salad with goat cheese and balsamic vinegar and olive oil. I taught myself to make preserves with them a few years back, and I give away almost every jar to my friends and family because at that point, I've just about had my fill and want to spread the love. They are one of the very best parts of summer for me, which--as someone who has almost no tolerance for hot or even warm weather--actually means quite a lot. They were a way for me to bring summer inside where it's cool enough for me to enjoy it. They are joy.

I don't have a lot of happy memories from my childhood. Something I've thought about a lot recently is that I don't remember feeling like a kid when I was a kid. I remember my friends playing make believe, playing school, playing with barbies, their pound puppies and all that, and I was never able to go there with them in my mind. I couldn't pretend. My childhood required vigilance and attention, and so, though I loved being with my friends, and I could admire the cuteness and softness of a stuffed animal, I didn't really have sentimental attachments to any of them, and I wasn't able to suspend disbelief during play. The things that brought me joy fell into really just three categories: 1) things I could physically do like swimming or riding a horse or hiking, 2) reading: reading was the outlet to another world, to pretend and play and use imagination that I couldn't access in my real life, and 3) moments of observation. I was happy experiencing the visual and tactile world. Watching a sunset or a storm roll in, picking apart owl pellets, studying the way the earth became sheets of mud with the rain, dried and cracked into shards that could be ground to powder afterward.

Living in the desert was perfect for such observations, and though there wasn't a lot to *do* out there, I think it made me someone who is comfortable with silence and solitude. There was one thing that my brother and I did get to do though, and that was to pick peaches. We had neighbors (not like next door--this was the country after all) who were an older couple who had a sizable peach orchard. Because they were older and they had relatively mature trees, it could be difficult for them to harvest all the peaches. So there were a few summers where Ross and I helped them out by climbing up the trees (so many trees) to pick the peaches. When we had done all we could and the sun was going down, we'd get a soda and a grocery bag full of warm peaches to take home with us and wait for our parents to come pick us up. I honestly have no idea how many times this happened. The memory is hazy at best. But helping this older couple (Frank and Suzy) who were so dear and grandparently and just good and kind people--it's one of the few moments of idyll that I have from that time in my life. And so for me, a peach is not just a peach.

Which brings us back to my original point--peach as red flag. The peach itself isn't the problem of course; the problem is not being able to look at a person you love who has something that is dear to them and say, Even though I don't like this, I'm glad you have something that brings you joy. That is my wish for you. What is it that brings you joy?

Yours,
Peaches