Have you ever seen an almond tree? In real life I mean...
Have you touched it? Have you smelled it?
I have!
It is amazing... the smell, the welcoming shade, the peaceful feeling, the overall sensation is rare and particular.
When I was growing up, in my hometown (somewhere on a tropical island) there were almond trees everywhere, and we kids used to sit under their cool shade during those long hours of the midday when the sun was just on top of our heads and everything was so hot. Nothing was more relaxing and fresh than the shade of a good big tree.
There was a very old and big almond tree in the front my house when I was a little girl. My grandma used to bring the rocking chair all the way from the porch and place it right under the tree, on the side where the shade was wider. In the morning she sits there and peels oranges we both eat, and then she hangs the long pieces of peel on the tree branches. In the afternoon she rocks me in the chair while we wait for mom and dad to come back from work. At night she goes to the rocking chair under the tree, and just sings and hums... sometimes when I'm not sleeping yet I join her, and we sing while she caresses my hands with her big and delicate hands. Those same hands that many years earlier planted that tree when my grandpa was just finished building the house.
That almond tree was part of the house and the family, no wonder why grandma cried so much when they felled the tree. It was so strong and big, its roots were breaking and lifting the tile floor of the porch, and some said it could even bring the house down. The nice shade was gone, along with the almonds and the leaves, but for a few more years we had the base of the trunk in front of the house because they couldn't take it out.
One day, not long after, my mom told me grandma was gone. Where? Why? I asked. Like grandpa, she said. Liar! I shouted and ran out to the trunk and sat there for hours, watching to both sides of the sidewalk, waiting for grandma to come back home.
The ground surrounding the almond trees was usually full of its fallen fruits, sometimes ripped, sometimes green, sometimes dried out. Those fruits are really delicious (once you get to know them) and so much fun, they would entertain us kids for hours, while chatting, singing or playing silly games. The green ones, we don't touch. The yellow or red ones, we eat the outside fleshy cover until we get to the woody-hairy part, then we smash it with a rock, and inside is where the almond we know is.
But even this smash needs a subtle touch of expertise. If you do it too hard, the almond inside would break into pieces and would mix up with some parts of the shell, and that there is a wasted almond. On the other hand, you need to put some strength to it since this cover is hard, like when you crack a nut. A nutcracker would have come very handily, but we didn't have any of those, so we used rocks, big solid hard rocks. The technique is to put it horizontally on a hard surface with the belly to the side, so when you hit it, it opens evenly and the almond inside stays intact. The dried ones, were the best to crack open, way easier, without the splash of juice when you hit it, but no flesh in the outside to taste.
And finally, we get to the best part, eating the almond inside! It would take a lot of time and lots of fruits to get to eat just a few almonds... but it was worth it and so satisfying and dangerous... more than one finger was wounded in this smashing battle! Also, the super staining juice of this fruits would stay in the rocks we used to open them, on our fingers, teeth, clothes, shoes, everywhere, ... causing us lots of troubles at home. This activity was kind of vetoed by Moms, yet another reason to enjoy it.
Under the almond tree at the back of my school's yard, my friend Zahily confessed me the story of her first kiss, the same tree I came crying to when my friend Adlin and I stopped talking to each other for God knows what silly reason..., that same almond tree where the three of us buried a goodbye letter for our classmate Dolores when she died at age 7.
That was my favorite place in the whole world when I was a child, nothing was more soothing for me than that smell, the cool and freeing breeze under those evergreen leaves, the sound of the wind moving those leaves with that unique rhythm, and that memory of me laying at its feet with my back on the ground and my legs up on its trunk, looking up at the blue sky beyond.
When I was a teenager, there was a special almond tree in the front of the school building during my years of boarding school. A quiet place, always empty of people, that instantly became my place, under my almond tree. The place I spent so many afternoons hiding from work with my close friends, laughing, sharing, telling... all while pilling and eating almonds.
This majestic tree kept most of my secrets, and all of my tiers, this was the only place I allowed myself to cry in the outside. It kept me company throughout those unforgettable sunsets I wanted to share only with myself. And also during those extremely hot nights when I couldn't sleep. Like that June night when I found a "declaration of love" letter in my bed, from my best friend, that night I knew I had lost him. And the night I ran out of the dorm room because one of my roommates was having intercourse with one of my friends' boyfriend. I sneaked out unnoticed in the middle of the night, angry, sad, confused... and I ran to my tree and just sat there for hours under the stars.
One of those sleepless nights, my tree and I were caught by surprise, an intruder. It was a boy, the new guy. It was his third night at the school, and at "My tree", he called it. How dared he? It was mine, my special place, my tree. But he was kind, super cute and had a very romantic night voice... so I listened to him for hours, we talked and talked, and got comfortable, so we came back the next night, and the night after that, to talk, to laugh, to read, until one night that (
just like Francesca y Paolo) we read no more...! Under that almond tree we kissed for the first time, and years later for the last. Right there he became my soul mate, my sweetheart.
That tree was the last thing I kept my eyes on the last day of school when I was leaving for good after graduation. That was the one place I didn't want ever to forget (like if I could).
Today when I eat them from those bags of roasted almonds, it feels so easy... so far away, but at the same time I remember the old times, and those images of children cracking them under the tree come to life, and those memories become so vivid that I can almost feel the resin sensation in my fingertips and my teeth, that sweet and sour taste of the past.
Today I have no almond tree to run to, only in my memories, they live in me and they will always be there for me when I need them.
