Osprey
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3694
Registered: 5-23-2004
Location: Baja Ca. Sur
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A Ride with Nando
A Ride with Nando
Fernando Morales didn’t have a car when I met him. Nobody could use a car that particular day. The pueblo had been trashed by Hurricane Ivan and now,
with the sun shining again, the wind a mere breeze from the southeast there were lots of people in the streets moving debris. We weren’t worried about
hot wires because the storm had knocked down some large transmission towers and we knew it would be days before we would get power to the village
again. Just a gang of dirty, glad to be alive survivors moving fallen palms and poles, clearing the dirt streets so eventually vehicles could move
about – it turned out we would be cut off from the rest of the world for about a week from Ivan; some people would eventually use pangas to try to
reach Highway One near Los Barriles once the waves subsided for good.
For me it was uplifting to be outdoors, to see the sun, to be doing something constructive. For most of the others it was just another after-the-storm
clean-up. Most of the young men I recognized to be construction workers; a few cementeros like Nando, two guys who worked for the city, a bunch of
school kids. Nando and I shared some tacos and beer at the little restaurant attached to the tire shop. He must have remembered that day, me, the
beer, platicando, because about three weeks later I saw him again, in a truck – he pulled up by my wall, held up a liter of beer and beckoned me to
get off my butt, take a ride with him.
I just yelled at my wife that I’d be back in a while, took off in the old blue hulk with my dogs barking like hell, chasing the truck, biting at the
big, bald tires. I thought we were headed for the beach but we went on by the Pemex, past the Castro farm and back on to the paved road to Vinorama.
It felt good to be out of the house – the cold ballena of cerveza was keeping my thighs and scrotum cool and damp. We couldn’t talk much over the roar
of the truck so he pulled off under the shade of a big guymuchil tree and opened the hood to show me the heart of the rusty rocket. The motor was huge
– half of it was spray-painted black; he must have done the firewall first, then half the big engine, then ran out.
He told me how he had saved up for the truck, finally had enough, got a ride to Rancho Chinal up in the mountains, helped the seller get it started
(the seller had no battery). He seemed to be almost proud that he only had one flat coming back down from San Dionysio to the highway. Nando said he
borrowed a spare to get back here to the village. I almost spilled some beer laughing when he told me the spare was from a little Toyota sedan. The
tires on the thing now were old but big – mountain tires, arroyo tires, rocket tires. I didn’t ask him the year of the truck but I think it was an 89,
¾ ton with an engine that seemed too large for the compartment.
Nando has done some work for me, some for my gringo neighbors; walls mostly, septics. They call him Wolf Man – I can’t tell him that. It’s because of
his long hair, his big flowing moustache and his unusual gait – he takes long loping strides. Always seems to be in a good mood, kinda quiet; when he
does take a little break he sits all alone in the shade, smokes and drinks his orange soda or cokes.
A little red car whizzed by honking and we waved. Don’t know who it was. I told him the truck would be perfect for his work, to haul madera for roof
jobs, cement, sand, rebar, gravel and tools. He just smiled and nodded, finished his beer and off we went again.
I don’t think he was thinking of the truck as a tool, as a way to get more work, expand his business horizons. Something in his eyes told me he was
thinking of the truck not as a way in but as a way out – a place where he could, just for a few fleeting minutes or hours feel the power, the force of
the big thing, the cold beer between his legs, the freedom – that evasive kind of sweat won freedom to do not what he had to do, what he needed to do,
what he was told to do, what was expected of him but a chance to do what he wanted to do – just ride the blue beast.
As I walked back onto the patio Lynda looked up from her book, waited for me to speak.
“Nando, new truck. Big ugly thing. We had some beer.” It’s a guy thing. She just smiled at me as though I were a small child, went back to her book.
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Keri
Super Nomad
Posts: 1393
Registered: 10-31-2002
Location: La Mision, Baja Norte
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Mood: muy contento
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Love it
Osprey, I hope your putting your stories in a book. I hope to see you at one of our booksignings very soon. You have a wonderful way with
words,picking up the small nuances in our personalities. k
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Iflyfish
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3747
Registered: 10-17-2006
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It's a guy thing, are your sure about that cold scrotum beer myster?
Great story. Felt like I was there.
Man I love how you write!
Iflyfishwhennotinaweofospreyswriting
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Osprey
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3694
Registered: 5-23-2004
Location: Baja Ca. Sur
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Thanks
Flyguy, Thanks. I was making a little fun of myself in this piece (and a few other gringos I know) by pointing out that even after interacting pretty
closely with a local working stiff I had the arrogance to see his purchase of an old truck as a business tool – couldn’t feel, see (automatically) the
all too seldom opportunities poor working men and women in Mexico have for self fulfillment and self expression. The piece is fiction – there is a
Wolf Man but he has no truck.
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