The Chymical Mix

This week has seen (at least for me) the most consistent warm(ish) and sunny weather of the year so far. It is the time of year when my thoughts always turn to dandelion wine. Dandelion wine is made from the petals of the yellow dandelion flower, best picked mid to late morning when the flowers are at their most fresh. The resulting wine is very light and has a hint of honey about it. Usually you add an orange to the fermenting mixture as well. However, the dandelion wine I am talking about is not a drink at all: it is a book.

In Dandelion wine, Ray Bradbury uses the making of dandelion wine as a metaphor for encapsulating summer in a bottle. It also deals with a young boy’s growing awareness of the adult world and death. However, when I first read it at the age of 11, there was another image that became imprinted on my mind, one that has never left me. The main protagonist, Douglas Spaulding, was just a year older than me, and fell for the wonderful advertising for a pair of Royal Crown Cream-Sponge Para Litefoot Tennis Shoes, “LIKE MENTHOL ON YOUR FEET!” This struck a chord with me because I had just acquired a pair of old-fashioned baseball boots, the ones with a rubber hemispere around the ankle bone. I really empathised with Douglas’ tendency to be roaming around his local area, talking to local characters of all ages, the tennis shoes magically making him faster and full of energy. That was exactly how I felt with my baseball boots. I think I read Dandelion wine at exactly the right time for it to completely captivate me, and even today it is my favourite book.

For many years after I first read it, it became a tradition for me to read it at the start of every spring. I read it every year until I was 20, when I tragically forgot to take it to university. After that, I read it again every year until I was 30, which coincided with several major changes in my life – marrying, moving and becoming a father for the first time. Even so, every year at about this time I always feel the need to take time out and think about Dandelion wine. I have read it another three or four times since I was thirty. This year, at the slightly worrying age of 48, I am going to read it again, so long as I remember to bring it with me from my home to my weekday accommodation here in Manchester!