Standing a few feet ahead of the Safeway entrance, I’m looking at peaches. They’ve got bundles—99 cents a pound. Peaches for days by my count. I grab a small plastic baggie and start to size up the lot. Peaches and white peaches. The white peaches look hardier. I pick one up and start to apply a little pressure when I hear someone speak.
So, what’s the difference between peaches and white peaches?
I turn and it’s an older woman, a little stout. She’s smiling. I smile instinctively, being friendly.
Well, I say to her, it’s a few things. Your traditional peach is softer than the white peach. It’s got a feel like it’d give at the slightest squeeze. It takes a more careful hand with one of those, whereas the white peach’s more tough. You could bounce it off the wall. Means the white peach’ll outlast a peach by several days.
She nods, still smiling.
Biting into this one’s also a different result. The traditional peach’s like a mango or watermelon, all juice. One bite and it’s a guaranteed waterfall. Some people like that, of course. Now, this white peach, it’s more subtle. It takes more tooth to get into and it doesn’t overflow the way a peach does. It’s also not as sweet, and it’s not right to go digging through it as quickly as possible. The flavor’s in tearing off a piece and allowing it to melt a bit, sort of like good chocolate. The white peach’s the patient man’s peach. I love them.
She’s still smiling.
And, I suppose, the color. A white peach is white.
She finally chuckles. Sure, of course.
I apply a little more pressure to the white peach and roll it around in my hand. It feels right. The stout woman goes and walks away.