The dewy winds of spring have departed, and the waters they brought are remembered only by the ripened fruit. In the garden, my cucumber plants grow in the shade of Mr. Bagel’s award-winning aloe vera. Finally, the time of their flowering has ended, and the harvest can begin.
Summertime, with its dry breath over the morning, needs for refreshment. Summers with Nana Bagel were filled with cucumber sandwiches and iced teas. When the flowers close, maturity brings mouthwatering crispness. But as I bring my cucumbers inside, the pungent smell of change wafts from the windowsill. My annual batch of pickle brine. Sunlight streams into the kitchen, filling the house with the familiar scent of warm vinegar. I know it well. Mr. Bagel has always loved pickles.
Thump, thump, thump. I drop my prized fruits onto the countertop and stare at them, hesitating for just a moment to seal their inevitable fate. After a minute or an hour, I draw a knife from the rack and position it over the first cucumber. It is dull, and it thuds against the skin, reluctant. I slide the cold metal slowly — agonizingly slow — and transform them into long spears built to pierce.
Into the brine they go, left to rot in the tears of their misfortune — a big stockpot of vinegar, salt, and spices whose scent now hangs heavy in the kitchen air. Each year, I somehow find myself standing longer by the window watching them shrivel and sour, as if forcing myself to witness the time slip by will somehow make it mean something. It doesn’t, and I know that. I stand and stare all afternoon anyway.
I bring a spoonful of brine to my mouth, and I am immediately hit with the overwhelming taste of coriander. My vision blurs; the liquid coats my throat and mouth. I draw in a breath to steel myself, but its scent fills my nose. Gagging, I pour more coriander seeds into the brine.
Mr. Bagel loves coriander. Come mid-summer, he will stuff his soggy hands down into the pickle vat, pluck out the juiciest pieces of briney fruit, and eat them all day in the backyard. Green juices will spill down the rolls of his supple chin as he plunges his hands into the sour liquid again and again. I never had an appetite for pickles myself, but I like when they taste like him.
The longer they sit, the richer the flavor, and yet — what do they give up by marinating in the very juices of their undoing? What dishes and jars will they never see? How many days and weeks will they spend wilting on the windowsill, growing less and less recognizable by the second?
I throw the kitchen cabinet open. Unlike myself, outside myself, I scour the cabinet not for inspiration, but desperation. Something, anything to add. Peppercorns. Dill. Sugar. Anything to justify the waiting, to make the weeks of stillness worthwhile.
I forget when I began living in the stillness. I hear my little Bagels tussle upstairs, and yet I cannot rip myself away from the swirling, dying visage of herbs in the jar. I shake it again, and watch them settle once more.
Anyway, here’s the recipe:
1. Add assorted spices to salted vinegar.
2. Add cucumbers. Bide your time.
3. Serve. Attempt to enjoy.
When not deep in editing, Jenna often finds herself practicing laughs in the mirror or querying the universe on ways to be funnier.
Amit is a cog in this machine. But doesn't everything run on optic cables or something?
Abby is a "journalist" who has never told a lie in her life. She enjoys long walks on the beach, beating dead horses, and running content at every possible moment.
