A Perfect Day, in the Countryside

It was early afternoon, they, Joseito, his eleven year old son, Lee and his wife Rosa, they arrived in a taxi, to the old dirt, and dusty road that led down a shadowy lane to Jose’s mother’s adobe premises: along this walk were tall adobe thick walls used for fences, and inside these walls were folks getting ready to plant for the season, and would harvest sometime in April through May, in this rural Peruvian landscape outside of the city of Huancayo, Peru.
Jose like the writer and poet Lee, had quiet drinking, Lee twenty-four years ago, Jose, had about one year of sobriety, but in that short time he had turned his life around most dramatically.

Lee, the elder, or we can call him the old man, was very proud of Joseito. He had befriended him some five years earlier, perhaps one of his first friends in the Mantaro Valley region, Joseito now being forty-years old. He had a radio station when Lee first arrived in the City of Huancayo, and had Lee on the radio a dozen times since concerning his cultural prose poetry, and the over thirty books he had written thus fare, but had given up the radio station since; about the time he stopped drinking. Now he was even doing better, the editor of a regional magazine, also into the Tourist Business, and was buying into an industrial channel on television.
It had appeared to Lee, Jose could see everything sharp and clear since he stopped his drinking, and nothing could stop him in the world of success. Perhaps even becoming mayor of the city, some time back, he had run for public office but did not make it, but chances were, he could next time, as long as he remained clean and sober, and energetic as he always was: he knew everyone in the business area, also in the political arena in Huancayo, and was respected, especially now that he was no longer connected to the bottle. Yes indeed, Lee had felt all the pot holes in his life were being filled with positive cement. And today, he and his wife were invited over to his mother’s hacienda.
He, Jose and his boy lived in an apartment in the city, he had raised his boy on his own you might say, and was concerned he should learn English as a second language, swimming and the computer, and in the taxi he had told the boy so, it was a world now, that without such skills, one might have less a chance in it for success, plus at a young age, one seemed quicker to learn such things. The boy listened.

As I was saying, the taxi stopped, and they were walking down this dusty path of clay and stone, occasionally you could feel underneath the dirt the hard rocks. And then came upon the old adobe walls that surrounded the premises of the Jose’s Mother’s property.
A slight trench had been cut between the walls with the door that lead into the open area of this hacienda type setting, and the field outside, which vegetables were to be planted in this widened area shortly.
Lee, as always wore a hat, so his head would not burn from the sun which seemed to be lower in this high area (some 10,500 feet above sea level), nor his face, he was white as rice, a gringo, they called him, and of course, his wife being of the Wanka stock of this mountainous area, as Jose and his son, were all bronze. Yet, seldom did he see Jose wear a hat, and today was no different. When they had first passed the adobe fence, belonging to Jose’s mother, two fellows were sitting at a table, drinking beer from his mother’s store, they had said their hello’s to Jose, Lee and thereafter, everyone went about their business.

Now inside the adobe walled hacienda, Lee walked about, the sun beating overhead, looking at the gardens here and there, chickens running about, a dog ran and captured one, killed it (someone said: ‘It was a good egg producer, too bad…’; a plum like, or cherry tree was in front of him—a little girl climbing it, red luscious small plums, two huge rabbits in cages, one the mother with its newly born, the other below, the father. Along one side of the property were large and small white pumpkins, and Lee noticed a water pipe had broken alongside a garden.
The electric wires to the premises were overhead. There was a time there was no electricity in this area, back when Jose was a boy, he’d sit under the moon’s light and do his homework: they had owned the property some 37-years. Back then Jose would have to walk a mile for water, and more than that for bread.
Times were changing, and as Jose reintroduced Lee and his wife Rosa to his sister, Elisabeth (a great cook and conscious mother), his mother, brother and the children, he thereafter, pulled out some old stumps, cut from a tree his father had cut down, back in the early 1990s (his father had died in 1992, it all brought a swelling of a smile to his face to mention it), and they sat and talked in the afternoon sun, with a breeze, while Elisabeth, cooked the Ginny Pigs (they had a cage in back of the place, where they raised them).
During this time Elisabeth and her older brother carefully fixed the broken pipe where water was gushing out, and set the table for all to eat. Ginny Pig was cooked with red sauce, and very tender to the lips, along with potatoes and rice. Elisabeth brought a second portion over to Lee, Rosa remained comfortable with her portion, even trying to get her husband to eat some of it, she was not especially found of Ginny Pig, like her husband. And they all laughed, under the wooden porch, as a storm approached, cleaning the dust and dirt of the countryside. And everyone put on their jackets, and sweaters, and continued to drink coffee, coke, eat, laugh and talk.
Jose, again pulled out those old wooden stumps, and they all sat the afternoon away talking under the sun (the little, three-year old for the umpteenth time was climbing that same berry tree), whereupon, Lee spotting a colorful centipede, and the four children—along with the tree climber, surrounded it and tried to play with it, then capture it, and then Elisabeth put a stop to it—the savior you might say for the little creature.
The younger child, the tree climber, Elisabeth’s little girl, came out to Lee’s side by the tree stump, with her colorful school work book, and they went through it page by page. Lee trying to trick her by saying one thing was another and the little girl would say, “No…” and point to the correct image within the book.

Somewhere in-between this afternoon, Jose had left the inner compound of the site, to visit his friends—those drinking beer he had introduced Lee to, he had returned, and after a short while, complained of being sick, thus, all found out he had had a beer with his friends, saying in essence, to his sister, ‘…I had to be polite.’ His sister saying, “Can’t you say no?”
And Lee reinforcing what his sister’s intentions was by saying what was said, “Perhaps this is a good thing that you have gotten sick, teaches you drinking is not for you—the Lord is saying ‘No more!”’ And he smiled at Jose, whom he liked, and was proud of.

It was a tranquil afternoon in the countryside, one with friends, one with sun beam rays upon one’s shoulders, and animals running to and fro, children playing, older folks watching (Lee and Jose’s mother), a storm to clean up the debris and dust, to water the fields, to fill the water holes (or the groundwater), a good and healthy lunch, laughs, it was a rich afternoon, where there was plenty of everything, and Lee wondered, perhaps Jose did likewise (How did the Lord put it all together, and was it just for them), for he, Jose commented on it, saying, “It’s a great day in the countryside,” looking at Lee, and Lee saying, “In twenty-years it will all be gone, it is best we absorb it now,” and they both looked at one another, knowing there was much truth to it. But as I was saying the Lord, Jesus Christ could not have made a more perfect day, and everyone took advantage of it.


Note, written: 9-15-2008 Dedicated to Jose Arrieta

Written by Dr. Dennis L. Siluk © 9/2008