Making Lemonade

My brother picked some huge ripe lemons from the tree the other day and when he carried them into the house he said, "Mom, look at the lemons."

To which she replied, "What?"

"Lemons," he said holding out the armful. And then louder: "Lemons."

"What?"

I joined him. "Lemons!" we both shouted. "Big, ripe, yellow lemons!"

"I don't understand."

"LEMONS!!"

"Oh," she said, not entirely convincingly. We gave up.

I don't think the incident was due entirely to her deafness. I think she really didn't understand the word, at least for a minute or so. Showing them to her didn't help, either, in my opinion, since they are so large and round they don't look like lemons except for being too yellow to be oranges and not quite big enough to be grapefruit (all of which are growing in the yard and ripening about now). They're sitting on the kitchen counter now and, just to be safe, my brother took a marker and wrote a big "L" on each one.

So far so good.