Sugar Water & Salty Tears On Hot Summer Days

“Y’all come on inside a get some of this sugar water! It’s too hot outside and y’all sweating.” My mama would yell over me and my younger sister’s laugher in the backyard.

Sugarcane

She would stand on the front porch with one hand on her hip. We both knew we would be thirsty. The faucet water never quenched our thirst enough in the Louisiana summertime heat.

We would both skip with excitement to gulp down our sugar water. The salty yet tangy taste of my sweat would race down my nose as I drank my sugar water. My sister and I would then pretend we were drinking something bubbly with bite. Making the “ah” sound after thinking something always made it seem more refreshing. Well, it did to me.

We did not have much, but we did have love. In addition to the love we had we had our imaginations. Watching PBS Kids when the bunny ears we used to catch a few local channels worked kept us excited. We always were eager to learn. I was fascinated by how other people experience life and the world around them. I wondered if my life would ever be as sweet as sugar water?

To me, sugar water was so much more refreshing than Kool-Aid. It was just two things that came from the earth. Sugar and water. Nothing more. Nothing less. The more sugar you added the sweeter the taste. The more water you added the more you can savor…