Bye Bye Mangos

8/17/15

 

It’s been almost 6 months since Grandma fell in her garage. I found her lying next to her lawn chair. She slipped off the edge of her chair when trying to lift her hefty okole (butt) over her weak, swollen ankles. Diabetes had not slowed her appetite for hot steamy manapua (Chinese shredded pork buns) and warm,sticky malasadas (Portuguese style sugar covered doughnut without a hole). Each Sunday treat was swallowed down with an icy cold can of cola. The introduction of diet cola did not improve her condition much. At her age of 90 something, her family did not deny her the favorite snacks she could not afford back in da old days.

The big mango and lychee trees behind her house are now barren of the fabulous fruit they bore this summer. The trees are as empty and lonely as the house she lived in. When she fell and broke her hip, she entered the long term hospital facility for the elderly. The house has been closed up and put up for sale.

The big trees, the height of 2 story buildings, dwarf the old ranch-style house which set the standard of success back in da day. I was glad she had the chance to enjoy the banner year of mango and lychee season. Her mango tree started to flower and fruit very early, since around February the flowers were little stars blooming in the mango heavens promising a bonanza of fat, luscious summer fruit. Before she died of a heart attack in late July, practically every form of green and ripe mangos were delivered to Grandma’s bedside by family, friends, friends of friends, neighbors and neighbors of neighbors. All sorts of pickled, salted, peppered,soy saucy, vinegary, crunchy,sticky, chewy, soft,and drippy summeriness stained her hospital gown. For a moment the stale hospital food and too cold air conditioning disappeared and she was back in her garage, with a sheet of newspaper on her lap, a kitchen knife, and sun warmed, ripe mangos in her palm. Expertly peeling, slicing away at her mangos, she shared her favorite snack with me and anyone who stopped by for a generous slice of fruit and good stories from her long life.

Da old trees swayed closer to da garage and listened. They loved her stories and her children climbing their branches and sitting in their shade. Grandma’s kidz told their own stories under her fruit trees while waiting foh school pau (finish),foh summah time, and mango and lychee season to come. Da trees kept growing taller den da house, dey watched Grandma’s children grow taller den her. Grandma got real old and da trees got real old. Den dis year, dey gave plenny fruit, filling buckets and freezers, jus like da aweweo run last summer. Unbelievable goodness and generosity from her family of trees was shared by everyone and anyone stopping by her garage foh talk story.

This summer, just when the mangos were slowing down, the Lychee came, like giant bunches of white, fleshy grapes dressed in rough crimson shells. Staring at the huge trees laden with fruit, eyes bulged with anticipation. They hung from the branches in heavy bunches. No one had seen a season like this in a long time, not even Grandma. Lychee trees everywhere were so plentiful roadside trucks sold bags and bags stuffed to da max. Every juicy bite burst with the scent of sugary red roses. It was hard to stop eating them, but there was always too much to finish. Bunches were frozen to enjoy like round, baby popsicles. Kids and adults slowly sucked on the frozen fragrant, sweetness of the hot summer’s bounty, licking their fingers and reaching for more. Peeling shell after red shell, as if they were peanuts at a baseball game, Grandma and I devoured her fresh picked lychee. Spitting the hard black pits into a bucket set beside her lawn chair, the next was ready to peel and eat between her sticky fingers. She used a kitchen towel to wipe her hands and face when she rinsed off the stickiness with a bottle of water. We were so busy eating , nobody talked. Just smiling and giggling silently to ourselves, like we were little kids, hiding from our parents because we picked da neighbors lychee without asking, which was equivalent to grand theft foh kidz. We sat together spitting out seeds and chuckling at the pile of red shells and seeds filling da bucket. Wuz good fun sitting in da garage jus eating lychee. So ono (delicious),“Broke da mout,”said our silent smiles.

Me and Grandma spit out da hard seeds only after we scraped off every last bit of gentle, chewy white flesh with our teeth (or dentures) and tongue. Greedily sponging up every bit of lazy warmth and drop of sunshine before it too quickly came to an end and summer was over. With stomachs full, fingers and faces covered in yummy stickiness, sunlight lingering into the early evening, it seemed like it would never end, but it did. Slowly, but surely the freezers emptied and the fading roadside signs, “Mangos and Lychee for Sale” were packed away. Just like the mangos rotting on the ground and the chickens pecking holes in them, summer was slowly dissolving. Then suddenly, the fruit was all gone. The rains started washing away the last of summah time. When the newspaper comes, I stand in da driveway sniffing for scents of fallen mango, and lychee shells floating in the humidity. I still look for da red dirt stained lawn chair in da garage. Knowing Grandma is gone, tears mixing wit da rain, I chant: “Bye bye Mangos, bye bye Lychee, bye bye stories , Grandma stay makay.”

Den da tears falling wit da rain, sing together da old day’s song:

“Aloha oi, aloha oi, until we meet again.”