Melon, Salt and a Knife
There is a way of eating melon in this family that involves no table, no plates and no conversation, and it began with my grandmother refusing to let anybody cut anything too neatly. The melon is halved, the seeds are scraped out with a spoon in long strokes, and then everyone gets a piece of rind and eats it with their hands, over the sink, in the evening, while the day is still hot.
The salt is the other part. My grandmother puts a small pinch on each half before the first bite, and she is right that the melon tastes more like a melon with it, though she has never been able to explain why and gets annoyed when anybody asks. The rind side gets more salt than the flesh, because that is where the salt belongs and everybody knows it except the rest of the world.
We did it in the heat of the last week of July and again last night. The children eat the flesh and leave the rind, which is their loss and our gain. My mother eats her piece standing at the window, looking at the street, saying nothing for twenty minutes, which for her is a sign of a good evening. Elena eats with a spoon and claims it is not the same, and then eats another half without the spoon.
The best melon of the year was the one that was not ripe when we bought it. It sat on the counter for four days and got sweeter and softer every hour, and on the fifth day it was the thing everybody in the house came home to. Now we keep the box on the sill and let it finish itself, which takes longer and is always better.