Escape from Heaven

John ran straight to the fence that divided the lawn of his house from the camp. He was running away from Highland.

 

Highland had built their commune in Paraguay. The country is divided by a river, which runs north and south. And the two sides, east and west of the river are starkly different. The east is basically tropical jungle and the west is known as chaco, or camp, or desert. One side is lush; the other side is barren. And yet there are vast stretches of chaco even on the jungle side. On the east there would be a vast stretch of chaco dotted with islands of tropical forests that were called wood islands. Sometimes these wood islands were many hundreds of hectares in size.

 

Highland was located near the middle of the country, on the jungle side of the river, about thirty miles west of a small river village called Rosario.

 

Highland. But really Heaven on earth. John and his wife basically had hiked the four thousand miles from Boston to Highland. It took them around two months. John, a pacifist during the Vietnam War, needed to get out of his war-hysterical country. He’d discovered Highland at a meeting of the Fellowship of Reconciliation. One of the Highlanders was giving a talk. He was in the States to raise money. John and Molly spoke to the speaker and told him about their desire to go to Paraguay. Of course he told them to reconsider and yet encouraged them at the same time, thinking he would never see them again. He was wrong.  John and Molly went to Paraguay.

And it was wonderful. The group had been isolated for so long that John and Molly were greeted like heroes. Molly and John were very happy to be at Highland. The people were so nice. Everybody was happy. Everybody helped one another. Everybody told the truth. Everybody sang. Everybody played some musical instrument or other. Everybody spoke in Highland meetings. Everybody had a voice, even women. And all decisions were made unanimously. They were truly a united group. Unity was the thing. If they felt any hesitation they simply didn’t make the decision, but waited until everyone agreed. It was in many ways heaven on earth.

 

John had long ago adopted the view that life, like a marriage, was a package deal. When you choose a wife, the family went with her. Same thing here. Highland practiced a radical form of Christianity, which involved living in a commune. The people looked and dressed like the Amish of Pennsylvania. He loved that part. He loved the naïve simple outlook of the Highlanders. Only their religious belief system was also simplistic and that bothered him. Their Christianity was primitive and fundamentalist. They had baptisms and all that. They married and had children. Unfortunately, thought John, they didn’t practice birth control and so had enormous families. Another part of the package.

 

And John loved the country of Paraguay. He loved the fruit trees. Right outside the door of their adobe hut there were grapefruit, orange, and mandarin trees. Nearby there were guava bushes, papaya trees, figs, and grapes. He loved the jungles. He loved walking in the jungles collecting exotic orchids of every description. He took them and hung them in a ring around the tree outside the hut. He loved collecting wild mushrooms. He even loved the snakes and pirañas and alligators in the rivers and the howling monkeys in the distance who announced the mornings with their screams. He loved the screeching families of colorful blue and red-feathered parrots that flew overhead daily.

 

He especially loved the Paraguayan people of the campaña. He knew enough Spanish to engage more or less intelligently. And the fact that his Spanish was imperfect made him all the more acceptable to the Paraguayans. He didn’t speak the highfalutin Castellano of Asuncion, where their ç’s were pronounced as the’ees. Instead of Asuncion, it would be Athunthee-on, the height of pretension to the campasino of Paraguay. He even picked up some Guaraní, the original language of Paraguay. And in the campaña, everybody spoke Guarani. In fact, the further away from the cities one gets the more one hears Guarani and not Spanish.

 

He often, during one of his jobs as Homeland's storekeeper, had good reason to go to the nearby villages of Itacurubì, and Santa Ni, and Vaca-Jhu, to go to the almaçens—the general stores to buy supplies for Highland and for his storehouse. Often he went on horseback and carried back the supplies he bought in saddlebags. He loved riding especially on the flat camp. He loved to slowly increase his speed from walk to trot to canter then finally to the smooth swing of the gallop. This is the life he thought, when galloping.

 

Most of all, he loved the music of Paraguay. The king of instruments in Paraguay is the harp. In the hands of a Paraguayan harpist the harp became an instrument of sensual passion. The music is striking, exciting, joyous, and passionate. The beat and rhythm of the music is a distinctive five beat, maintained by guitars. Those of you reading this story, please go to You Tube and search for Paraguayan music and you’ll hear what I’m trying to express and you’ll understand one of the reasons John loved Paraguay.

*

In order to become complete members they had to go through a period of what was called the novitiate, then they had to go through baptism classes, and eventually they were baptized—that made them complete members. Molly bought it all with enthusiasm and became a true believer and faithful Highlander. John continued in his package-deal mentality, still thinking it was worth it.

 

There was a structure and hierarchy. The top was called the Keeper of the Word. There were two Keepers. The Keepers would lead the Highland Business meetings, as well as religious prayer meetings. They were like priests, but more than priests. They were the ultimate spiritual and practical authorities over every aspect of the communal life. The second layer of authority was called Helpers of the Keepers. There were about a dozen of these. They met with the Keepers when called and discussed issues and problems Highlanders may be having. Usually the problems involved sex. Helpers, also led prayer meetings, read religious books in the dining room during the communal meals, and provided counseling to Highlanders upon request.

*

Then the day came when John realized everything was wrong.

What happened, John wondered? I was so happy. It was so good. What went wrong? When did it go wrong? What happened to Molly and me? John couldn’t believe eight years had gone by, and they went by so swiftly. Where did they go?

 

The day would begin every weekday morning at 6 am. Molly and John would have breakfast together at 7 am. Work then began at 8 am. Molly taught art in the highland school, and John went to the turning shop. Everybody worked until 10 am, when there was a break that Highlanders called second breakfast—tea and usually toast and jam or cookies. This lasted for about a half hour. Then work resumed until shortly before noon. At noon, lunch was served in the communal dining room. Adults all ate together. Children had their own dining room. After lunch there was a siesta until 2 p.m. Afternoon tea until 2:30 p.m. and work resumed at 3 p.m. John, turning. Molly, teaching. Work ended at 5 p.m. and everybody went high. This was followed by another communal meal, dinner, at 6 p.m. Dinner was followed by a communal meeting, also held in the dining room. These meetings usually lasted until around 10 p.m., sometimes longer. Then back again to sleep and in the morning, the next day began.  John and Mary did not have much time together. One hour at breakfast, when they actually sat down and were able to talk. Another half hour at afternoon teatime. And another hour between the end of work and dinner. But these were usually rush rush hours. The only, more or less, leisure hour was breakfast. And that’s because they didn’t have children. They tried to have children but Molly couldn’t get pregnant. She had two miscarriages. Most families had many children, usually up to a dozen. And so the private time of the family was extremely frenetic in the so-called free family time slots. Getting up to a dozen or so children washed, dressed, feeding them, and sending them off to the Highland school was always a mad rush.

 

The major commitment of each person was to the community. It was as if John was married to the community rather than to Molly. That Molly was married to the community rather than to John. This became explicit after baptism. The baptismal rite was considered to be more important than the marriage rite. Commitment to the Highland was more important than the marriage commitment to each other. There was no “ownership” of one another in a Highland marriage. But there was ”ownership” of each person by Highland.

 

So the work was hard, and the rest periods, siesta and night sleep were needed. Yet, in a way it was wonderful. Everybody belonged. Everybody had his or her place. John’s first job was in the wood turning shop. He loved woodturning. The work was hard but he was young and had the stamina it took to stand by a lathe for hours at a time. Living in the jungles, the turning shop had scores of very hard woods available. Many of the woods were beautiful. John learned to be a turner. He loved creating a beautiful object, like a simple salad bowl, or a plate, or candlestick, or wooden cups, out of rough blocks of wood. Turning was truly an art craft. This was a very happy time for him that lasted for two years. Jobs shifted at Highland.

 

His next job was to be the cook of the village. This was strenuous work. And this assignment lasted another two years. The kitchen is the hub of the community. Everything and everybody went through the kitchen. Work was long and hard. There was no refrigeration; so dealing with food was difficult. Many a night John was awakened by the night watchman to come quick to the kitchen, for a cow had broken it’s leg, and was slaughtered. The carcass was brought to the kitchen, and John had to butcher it, salt the large chunks of meat, and hang them in a meat closet for the night. These nocturnal interruptions lasted several hours. And so John usually crashed hard at siesta and bedtime. He would often nod away during meetings.

 

His next job was storekeeper. This also lasted two years. As storekeeper he ordered food supplies for the community. Distributed canned food, marmalade, butter, eggs, for family breakfast and afternoon tea. He worked with the cook to supply the kitchen with needed foods like flour, bread, oils, etc. and together they planned the daily menus. The best part of this job was that John was alone. He loved to putter about and make things like jams and marmalade. He made a great lemon curd!  He even learned how to mix liquors and distributed these little delicacies to families, much to their delight. He enjoyed making people happy. He dabbled in wine making and even made beer. John was very happy during these two years. And it was during these years that the brotherhood elected him to become a Keeper’s Helper. As Helper he led religious meetings and did the readings during meals in the dining room. John very much enjoyed this. He searched about for interesting stuff and hit upon C. S. Lewis’ Narnia Chronicles that became a big hit with the community.

 

So in many ways there was fulfillment in John’s life. But it was during his years as a Keeper’s helper that he began to see Highland from the inside, to see the seamy stuff. Twisted sexuality was a major problem. He had a hard time with just about every decision on sex the Keepers and their Helpers made. He found he was agreeing to things because to disagree would be to align himself with the sexuality being condemned and even worse to obstruct the unity of the group and he would be in trouble.  Slowly, the idea developed in his mind that the driving force of Highland was not Jesus, or even Christianity, but Unity. Of course they would say unity in Christ. But it was unity pure and simple. With or without Christ. Christ had nothing to say about masturbation or any of the sexual deviations engaged in by some of the Highlanders. And any sexual deviation was punished severely. Punishment usually consisted of banishment from the group.

 

The ones who suffered most were the children when they began to explore their budding sexuality. The line was that sex in all of its forms was evil. Even sex between married couples was suspect if the stated object was not to create children. And so married couples had to pretend that the natural orgasms that celebrated their sexuality were repulsive to them. John found this pious hypocrisy corrosive and ridiculous.

 

Then there was his marriage. John and Molly led parallel lives at Highland. He went his way. She went her way. They had breakfast together, slept together, when not too tired, had sex together. But they were not together. Molly was an artist. She painted and did sculpture. She never really got far with her art in the States. Here, she was successful. Here, she was needed. Here, the children loved her. She was inspired by their enthusiasm. She taught them to paint, to sculpt, to work with paper maché. Molly was happy. She loved the community. She saw that everybody was happy. She loved the evening meetings, the open discussions, and the Quaker-like silence before making decisions that were always and only made when everybody agreed. Unity was wonderful. And she and all the women of the community had an equal voice in the meetings. Molly had found herself at Highland. She was accepted in a way she had never been before in her life. She completely adopted the garb, the dress, the style, and the religion of Highland. She became a different person—pious, loyal, and had all the marks of a new convert, which included intolerance for anything or anybody who deviated or was different. And so tension between John and Molly slowly and silently grew and was fueled by their inability to have children, and be like the other normal Highland families.

 

Then there was the problem that John was not able to share what went on in Keeper’s meetings where personal problems of Highlanders were discussed. He was dying to tell her about his anger at the hypocrisy of the ridiculous righteous attitude on sexuality on the part of all the Keepers and their so-called Helpers. But he couldn’t. John and Molly lived separate lives.

 

The package was beginning to build up pressure inside of John’s heart and mind. Two incidents caused the explosion. First was when one of the Keepers privately confided that he was having a hard time dealing with erections while he showered and washed his genitals. And he asked John for advice on how to the deal with this. John knew that if he answered honestly, the Keeper would be shocked and declare John to be in a state of sin. So John advised the Keeper to just wash and not think about it and consider it a form of purifying temptation. It went over big. The second was when one of the Highlanders, a simple guy, came to John to talk with him. He said he lived in fear and terror all the time. Especially during Highland business meetings. He was afraid to express what he really thought about anything. He feared that if he differed openly he would be accused of disunity and one thing would lead to another, he would be accused of all sorts of sins that ultimately would lead to accusations of sexual deviations, and therefore banishment.

 

From this point on John saw the look in people’s eyes. He saw the fear. He saw the unconscious enforced compliance. Unity at all costs.

*

It happened early at around four in the morning. His heart was heavy. His mind was exploding. He woke up in a sweat. Bolt upright in his bed, he inwardly screamed. Molly was lying beside him, so he dared not make a sound. He dared not tell her what he was feeling—what he was dreading, and that he was bursting. If he did he knew she would run to a Keeper and report his apostasy. So he quietly slipped out of bed not waking her. He dressed, filled his pockets with Paraguayan cigaros and his Zippo cigarette lighter, and he put on his wristwatch. He took a maleta, an elongated sack-like bag with a slit in the middle, off the wall and filled it. On one side he stuffed it with galletas, the hard rolls of the campaña. On the other side he poured some yerba mate tea and put a gourd and bombilla, a silver straw-like tube to sip tea, for hot mate and a guampa or cow-horn for terèrè—cold mate. He reached for his straw hat, hanging on the wall, and quietly left the house. The house he and Molly lived in was one of the preferred houses on Highland. It was located on the edge of the village bordering the camp. A barbed wire fence separated the property of Highland from the camp. He ran to the fence. He lifted one of the barbed wire strands and made his way through, careful not to get stuck and cut by the sharp metal thorns. Successful, and now outside of the Highland property, he ran to the road which led to the nearby villages of Santa Ni and Vaca-Jhu. He turned and looked back at his house while running. Saw it slowly receding as he continued. Then he felt the burst of the cold air of freedom. And he ran and ran and ran.

 

Trying to believe. Living in the heavenly realms of a new social order. Believing he knew what was what and what he knew he knew to be right. Believing that he was living Christ’s way of life. He had been living the Kingdom of Heaven, in the jungles of Paraguay. And he was running away from it. Running away from God’s Kingdom. Running. Running.

 

Running. Where to? The road led to the canal where the animals drank and refreshed themselves and where he looked forward to doing the same—then to Santa Ni, then to Vaca-Jhu, and further on to Curuguaty. Santa Ni is the larger of the cities. Cities of the campaña usually are a row of houses on each side of an unpaved road. In the winter the road is hard and more or less usable. In the summer during the rainy season the road is a sea of maybe several inches of mud. Chickens and pigs crisscross the road more than people do. Santa Ni boasts a bank, a church, an almaçen, or general store, and a one-room schoolhouse. Vaca-Jhu only has an almaçen, but at least you can buy some groceries, some meat, and most importantly, caña, the alcoholic whiskey of Paraguay made from sugar cane.

Santa Ni won't work because the Highlanders are well known there. Especially the vaquero Highlanders who work cattle on the estançia. The vaqueros, cowboys, were the easiest to get along with because they mixed with the outside world of the campaña of Paraguay. They often had to herd Highland cattle through villages such as Santa Ni and were well known. First, because they are gringos and second, because they grow beards. And the Paraguayans, thinking it funny to wear beards in a subtropical climate, with a twinkle in their eyes, called them barbudos, the bearded ones. In all other ways the Highland vaqueros were the same as Paraguayan vaqueros. They dressed the same: bombachas, full blown trousers which gathered at the ankles, an open shirt, a wide brimmed straw hat, and a faja, or sash, or cummerbund, worn around the middle which held their pants up, with shirts tucked n their pants. In the back, stuck between the faja and the body, was a long thin-bladed knife bundled with a sharpening steel, encased in a leather holster. And of course, high boots decorated with spurs. This is a vaquero. And the vaquero Highlanders found release from the piety of fundamentalist belief in their vaquero persona.

 

Unfortunately, Tom had a beard on his face and the Paraguayans would stigmatize him as another barbudo. But he thought he could show he was different. He could speak Spanish and knew a few words of Guaranì, the language of the campaña.

 

And so armed with his Spanish and little Guaranì John thought he had a chance to make it. He would go on and on until he found a rancho. He knew he would be offered matè to drink. He’d tell them he no longer was a barbudo and drink their matè and say his few words of Guaranì and maybe they would put him up for the night. Then next morning he would continue and go deeper into the interior of the campaña—so deep and so far, nobody would ever find him again. Maybe he’d go as far as Curuguaty. Maybe, one of the many smaller villages around there. Maybe somewhere between Curuguaty and further south to San Estanislao, where they hadn’t heard of the barbudos. Without a beard he really wouldn’t look like a gringo for he was dark-skinned and maybe could be taken for a Paraguayan—at best an Asunceno. But he didn’t know what was worse in the campaña, to be a barbudo, a gringo, or an Asunceno.

 

He looked back and no longer saw Highland. There was only the camp and the high grass. Before him was the camp and the wood-islands which dotted the camp. And a telegraph line and poles that led further east to Santa Ni. John knew the poles even went beyond, to the triangle border between Paraguay, Argentina, and Brazil at the magnificent waterfalls: Foz do Iguaçu.

 

So he couldn’t go wrong following the telegraph poles. The further he went the more likely it would be that he would not be known. But he should have thought of bringing his razor so they wouldn’t immediately label him barbudo. Why didn’t he think of a razor? But he dashed away impulsively. He got to the point were it was break or break. So he broke. What would happen to Molly? Molly believed with the Highlanders that he had been infected by the Devil. She believed God had vested his Kingdom in the community—the Highland. She took the side of the Highland against him. But she thought she really was taking his side for she was sticking to God. She knew in her heart that the devil would eventually lose and God would win. John would then thank her and love her for not deserting God for she was not really deserting him, John, for she would be there for him ready to fold him in her embrace together in the arms of Christ.

 

So he made the break. Molly once had told him to do it after a nap-less siesta talk they had about his feelings. She’d told him to go out into the wilderness and think things over. Get closer to God in the desert. Go out into the steaming camp like the Desert Fathers did, like John the Baptist did, and find yourself. And then he felt the hot sand of the camp-desert dance along the sides of his sandals stinging his feet.

 

He thought about St Francis. Maybe that was the way. The true Christian way. Without purpose. Without plan. To wander the countryside preaching. Then he looked at his watch and smirked. St Francis with an Omega wristwatch, cigaros in his pocket, and a Zippo cigarette lighter. He took out a cigaro and lit it. Some Saint Francis. Some Desert Father. Some John the Baptist.

 

He reached the branding corral of the Kelly Estançia of Texas, North America. This was by far the largest estançia in Paraguay covering thousands of hectares. Nobody really knew how much. The Kelly Estançia was one of the largest employers of vaqueros in Paraguay. John thought he had a good chance to get a job. First of all, he could speak English and that was always a plus with the gringo Americano owners. Second, several times, because he was such a good horseman, he was asked to go on trips with the vaqueros to buy cattle from other estançias and herd the cattle back to the community. Also he had done several rodeos that involved branding and castrating male cows, turning them into oxen, with his sharp knife. And most of all he knew horses well and was sensitive to their gait. As he neared the corral he stopped short for there, near the entrance to the corral, were three men on horseback. Barbudos. Must be vaqueros inspecting the cattle of the corral, probably out to buy.

 

He tried walking slow so he wouldn’t be seen then tried walking fast so he wouldn't be seen. But this was dumb. He turned and went back to the road. Still unseen by the vaqueros he thought. He got to the telegraph poles and followed them again to the east. It was getting towards midday. The sun was bright in the sky. And it was getting hotter and hotter. But his thirst for freedom was greater and he rushed on. He was on rough camp now. Soon, lower down, it would be muddy. Walking would be difficult. He wondered what sort of ground John the Baptist walked and whether he really did live on wild honey and locusts. Honey he could understand but locusts—ugh! That was something else that used to get him into trouble: not believing the Bible literally. Yes he had a hard time with the locusts. He wondered if John found a way of making them taste good. Perhaps if you fried them up a little with a little bit of salt and stripped the wings and no—he couldn’t work up an appetite for locusts.

 

This reminded him he was hungry. He reached in the galleta side of the maleta, pulled one out and began to eat. There was a touch of sweetness to the hard biscuit. Much better than locusts. He ate another one and thought that was enough. Later when he got to the canal he could drink terèrè from the cold running stream. For now, he smoked a cigaro. He rolled up his pants for the camp was getting swampy. And it was rutted. You had to walk very carefully. Hot stagnant water streamed at the bottom of the ruts. He had to walk on the unrutted strips of land that broke up the camp. He tried to make a game of it. The ruts were in most cases about a foot deep and when he missed a strip the miss would jerk him off balance and flop him and splash him all over and the sun was hotter than ever and he jerked and hopped and flopped forward thinking of St Francis, John the Baptist, the fucken locusts and what he wouldn’t give to be back in a New York City Sixth Avenue bar once again drinking a cold beer when he turned.

 

There, not far behind, was someone on a horse, following very carefully, because of the ruts. This was one of the worst kinds of riding. The rider was bearded, one of the vaqueros. So they had seen him after all. Should he wait for him or should he go on? If he went on he would look guilty and ridiculous. It was so hot. And stopping encouraged the mosquitoes. He turned around and there was Peter.

 

“Hi,” said Peter “What you doing?”

 

“Walking,” said John.

 

“Hot time of day for a walk,” said Peter. Then he looked grave and said, “Anybody know you're going on a walk?” He meant, Have you received official permission to leave the Highland?

 

Ignoring the translation, John said, “Nope.”

 

“Humph,” grunted Peter. “How far you going?”

“Dunno. Maybe the canal. Get myself a cool dip.”

 

“Going to think things over?” again with gravity in Peter’s voice.

 

Christ! Here they go again. They all must know about him. But he felt a freedom in Peter’s question. So they know. And they must also know that he no longer was one of them. One of the Highlanders. One of the barbudos. There must have been a meeting of the Keepers and the Helpers. They must have discussed him. His heresy. His apostasy.

 

“Yes,” he lied.

 

“Well,” and now with heart-felt gravity “think it over positive brother.” Highlight on the brother. Peter leaned over from his saddle and extended his hand to John. John accepted the hand. They shook. Peter added extra pressure being a vaquero. He turned his horse and carefully rode away.

 

John watched Peter ride. He felt tight. Crammed in. Now they would know where he was, where he was going. They could find him. He continued his way to the canal.

 

But a little of his enthusiasm was gone. He followed the telegraph poles. He had never made this journey alone and it was hot and the way got more and more muddy and his pants were soaked and his mouth was dry.

 

The way Peter said, “Think it over positive brother.” Just like a true Highlander. He thought of Roberta, Peter’s just married wife and how happy everybody was that finally Berta made it. He thought of how often he erected at the sight of Berta’s swinging full breasts as she bounded across the square of the village running to the kitchen, skirts held high in her hands, exposing her shapely legs that everyone furtively stared at and dwelled upon in their secret desires. Berta worked the sick kitchen and favored and pampered and teased him as well as all of the young men on the square of the village where the kitchen was located. Especially the vaqueros who dropped by for the drink of water Berta was always pleased to give them. Peter came often. Berta had gone through an emotional crisis whenever one of her old school boy or girl Keepers got engaged. All the engagements and marriages on the Highland were arranged. Arranged by the Keepers and the parents. Why didn’t anyone ever arrange anything for her, she wondered? But finally it happened. And John thought back at how happy, especially happy; everybody was about Berta and Peter’s engagement. The air in the village snapped with frivolity when they were married. He remembered old Maraia, one of the older pioneer women of Highland, naughtily saying, “Now poor Berta may lay in peace.”

 

These thoughts peppered his mind as he approached the canal. And there it was: the canal. The water was hot. The sun was smack in the middle of the sky. The heat gripped him. He was trapped by it. Trapped by an earthly Heaven and now trapped by a heavenly Hell. He went into the water and walked down the canal looking for a place on the bank where there were some bushes and some shade where he might lie down. He remembered there were high guava bushes along the bank and went looking for them. It took about fifteen minutes to find them. He stretched out under the bushes and rested.

*

With a start and pain in the back of his neck John woke up. The hot rays of the sun were burning. He was sweating and aching and still tired. He looked at his watch and figured he slept for not more than half an hour. He had to find a cooler place on the canal. He rose and walked down the canal again. Walked a good stretch but it was miserable. Maybe it would be better to go back. Back the way he came. But he was far down the canal. So now he had to keep walking until he found those damn telegraph poles. Probably a good hour or so away. So to the poles.

 

The sun wouldn’t release him until late in the afternoon. He dipped his head in the canal, took off his shirt, soaked it in the water, and put it on hoping it would cool his burning skin. It didn’t.

 

He found the poles. They paraded in giant steps across the swamp-camp. He followed their steps. Maybe there would be a rancho somewhere on the way. Maybe with a deep cold well. With lots of water. Maybe.

 

Walking was hard. He stumbled and flopped and continued across the hot camp. Then he heard a loud screech and a swooping and swooshing of wings. A huge condor flew down and up to the top of the pole nearest to him. He looked up at the savage bird. He remembered once, outside an almaçen, perched on a fence, seeing a condor gripping a chunk of raw meat in its talons, snapping down with his razor-sharp pointed beak, and ripping apart the meat. And he was scared. He continued walking toward the next pole. The condor swooped ahead of him and reached the next pole and landed on top. As if waiting for him. The swooping scared him. But condors eat carrion. And I’m not dead yet, he thought. But who knows? What if this condor is hungry? Who really knows what it’ll do? What he did know is that he shouldn’t stop. He should go on. He looked for rocks or a limb of a tree or something to throw. But there was nothing. It was a naked camp. He remembered his Zippo lighter. He reached in his pocket and gripped it hard. What a beast! What a weapon! And then he remembered his knife. He let go of the lighter and pulled the knife out of its sheath and held it blade up, ready to swing if he needed to. He looked hard at the bird. The poles began to wend their way into the forest. The condor flew with them into the forest, and John felt safe.

 

Then John saw a rancho at the edge of the woods. Maybe there was a well. And he ran. He saw it. A large box covered the hole in the ground that was the well. The box was meant to prevent animals and people from falling into it. He lifted the lid, stripped naked, and lowered himself into the well feet first, holding on to the ladder on the side of the well hole. He reached the water and continued down until the water reached his neck. He loved the thrilling cold of the water. He thrust his face full in the water and drank drank drank. He then climbed out. Refreshed. He took his clothes and went down the well again with them. He rinsed them soaked them and wore them soaking wet and icy cold. He got out of the well and to his surprise saw that he was being watched. An enormous Paraguayan woman and two men had been lying on leather-thonged beds looking at John in amusement and amazement. John approached them. Their smirky stares made him realize what a strange sight he must be dripping all over the place.

 

“Em-ba-ì-japà,” the older of the men greeted.

 

“I-va ì,” Not too well, responded John, “hace mucho calor.” It’s very hot.

 

“Si,” he said. “Toma siento,” Take a seat, he said pointing to a nearby chair. He turned to the woman and said something to her in Guaranì that included the wonderful word “terèrè” and John knew he would soon be drinking a cold matè. She nodded in response, disappeared into one of the rooms of the rancho, and returned bearing a pitcher of cold water in one hand and a guampa with a bombilla sticking out if it. She poured the water into the guampa and offered it to John. John took it and drank. The cold bitterness of the drink refreshed his dry mouth and he felt wonderful. He sucked the guampa dry, returned it to the woman who refilled it and gave it the older man who was now sitting upright on his bed. He drank the guampa dry. The woman gave the next drink to the younger man. Then back to John. This continued until each of them said gracias. The drinking over, now the talking can begin.

 

“Fuiste a visitar Domingo?” asked the older man. Apparently, Domingo lived nearby.

 

“No,” said John. “I don’t know Domingo. I was walking along the canal.”

 “Ah, si,” said the younger man. After a moment, he said, “Porqué?” Why?

 

“Estavo buscando algo,” he said. Looking for something.

 

“Ah si,” said the younger man, looking strangely at John. There was another quiet moment.

 

 Then the older man asked, “Que classe de algo?” What kind of something? He said this seriously at first, and then his face broke into a broad smile.

 

 John rose, said “Algo muy importante.” He rose, said, Gracias for the drink, and “’Ta-luego,” See you, turned and began walking away.

 

Both men rose and watched him. When he was far away but still in hearing distance they laughed and shouted, “Adios loco barbudo. Adios barbudo loco.” And they slapped their thighs, pointed at him, and laughed.

 

John turned and saw their swaying and laughing and heard their loco barbudo, loco barbudo. He turned again in the direction of God’s Kingdom. He saw the camp and the telegraph poles. He saw, in the distance, the condor on top of a pole. And then he heard Loco. Loco. Loco. 

 

 

March 10, 2009