SUMMER SEPTEMBER HEAT – 50 Gms

“What was it that Proust said about memory – of it being two kinds: the kind that struggles to recall where you put the reading glasses and one that fills you up involuntarily with a deeper gust of longing and nostalgia, suddenly and surprisingly when you find something – while looking for the glasses? Breathing in fire and breathing out fumes all through the summer only to be breathing bubbles through the monsoon humidity – thinking, enough of this infernal heat shamelessly shimmying off the asphalt; thinking, the girl from this side of paradise was absolutely right about summer: about it being the unfulfilled promise of spring, a charlatan in place of the warm balmy nights one dreams of in April; thinking, monsoon – yet another charlatan, a ‘feels like’ season, a summer by extension – hot, horrid and humid; thinking, their summer romance over, the lovers still cling to each other, the way the green leaves cling to their trees in the strange heat of September, as if this time there will be no autumn. “No Autumn? Hah! Embroidered Blue skies, the distilled sunlight, the grassiness gone, the air fruity-ripe, dusk not falling but gathering slowly, laying down sheet by sheet – if not for this ripening September heat it would already be Emerson’s October skies and Indian summer: a warm autumn day!” 

“It doesn’t take much to sleep through the September Heat though, especially when you have such hope, such anticipation, such ‘autumn’ in your heart; until you wake up and wander out at some ungodly hour and a cool passing breeze slows down just for you, takes a moment and hauntingly whispers, “This is it – no more summer for a whole year.” ……and suddenly the heart skips an autumn beat and gathers a cold wintery dread! What was it again, that Proust said about memory – about it being two kinds….?”

Oh, it’s ripe – literally, this September Heat. Generous. Attentive. Intensely fruity, intimately appealing, extremely smooth and expressive with flavors embroidered – needled by a summer threading the three varietals into cascades that build, rise, then invert – build, rise, then invert– build, rise, then invert, with an attentiveness, impossible to miss. Shimmying flavors of Blueberries and Grapes rise up, tweak the imagination and then fall down in sheets of Fruity Jams, Biscuits, Butter and Flour revealing the passionate lingering warmth of September Heat: A Ripe, Red Fruity Wine – more like a Mulled-Wine in September Heat – With a sweetness led astray by lemons. Strangely enough it misses the Caramels – instead a tantalizing floral note shimmies right up – right through the ripe September Heat. Even stranger is the temperate coolness of Camphor mixed with tropical coconuts expressed with a woodiness that’s left much to the imagination – you see, the September heat is over before the last of it can be fully expressed.

Summer Black Tea from Sikkim, made out of P312, T78 & Nand Devi (TS 378) cultivars.