When I was kid, my Pawpaw and Granny lived in the country in a tiny speck of a town, Ohatchee Alabama…

My summers spent there were magical, my Pawpaw grew a garden, full of vegetables that we ate but the watermelons… oh the sweet juicy red watermelons were my favorite thing. Pawpaw would go early in the morning to pick one, he’d ice it in a huge ole cooler under the carport, after dinner, he’d carry it out to the giants tone slab table in the side yard and split it with a butcher knife whose sole job was just that. We would eat the sweet melon til we could eat no more and the chickens got the leftovers. It’s been over 50 years since I’ve shared a melon with Pawpaw but every time I cut one. That’s where my mind transports me, a shady yard, a huge stone slab table and my Pawpaw laughing and telling me if I swallow the seeds a watermelon will grow from my belly button. I need a watermelon 🍉