I asked him the
whereabouts of his older siblings - the twins, and the Pelona. His
mom forbid them to run today, he said. Running made them even more
hungry, and they were hungry enough. I’m not sure how Andrés was
granted an exception, probably via those gentle doe eyes.
The runners, ages
5-13, were all members of our farming kids collective, Club Conuco
Colibri. We had set Tuesdays and Fridays as days to run
together, just for fun. Soon, we were
off….. Whizzing past caraota and potato
fields, past skinny cows and grazing horses, past sheep and
shephards, past the eucalyptus trees
casting shadows onto the irrigation lake.
The cool air
mountain filled my lungs, the majestic
Fumarola lifted my spirits and the warm hand of Andrés lifted
my heart, I was flying, my worries about this imploding country
flung aside, my anguish
for these beloved little running mates tossed to the wind. As
the gentle slope coaxed
me easily downhill, I felt déja
vu for the easy slide into good living Venezuela
had experienced only a few years back.
Healthcare,
education, housing, food, the good life -
it seemed there for everyone.
As we ran on and on
Andrés held tight to my hand. I was not used to jogging while
hand-holding (or jogging at all for that matter), but it was kind of
nice. He had no problem keeping my pace.
Several kilometers
later we reached our goal - the cotoperí tree right beside the
churning river. We tumbled into a pile and
Andrés plopped in my lap. We allowed ourselves to rest and to laugh
and just be together. No need to think about the approaching night,
or the long uphill walk home, or the hunger stirring in our bellies.
But as the mountain
turned from pink to crimson, we rose quietly to begin the long return
hike. How different the journey home: Arduous,
steep, dark, dangerous, and with hunger
in our bellies. Like
that journey we are on now as a nation – or at least those of us
remaining.
As crimson turned to
black I realized that I was following these children, so sure-footed
on this mountain. They looped their arms into mine, grounding me,
guiding me, protecting me from unknown precipices, lurking snakes,
ghosts of which they spoke quietly. As the stars began to fill the
night sky, Andrés deposited me at my gate, tired but safe. Hasta
mañana Lisa he said with a huge hug, then raced up
the hill to his home, and probably an empty table.
Andrés is the
youngest of our kids farming collective, which is best described as
something of a ragtag 4H group, or perhaps a community CSA where kids
are the farmers and the shareholders. It all started a few years ago
- rather spontaneously, when my neighbor Fabi – then age 10 - showed
up one day to help me plant (yet another) mango tree and asked when I
would start planting something that turned into food more quickly.
Until then, I had only planted fruit trees – hundreds of them, but
admittedly, it took several years from digging a hole to getting
something into your mouth.
This was just the
beginning of the food crisis (little did we imagine…..) but Fabi
already had a vision, as she eyed the only flat spot on my land,
recently bulldozed for a future gazebo. She showed up at 6 am the
next morning with her cousin Jonjon, a sack of goat manure, some
bamboo poles and a plan. They set to work with hoes and shovels and
by early afternoon we had some decent
raised beds.
By the next weekend
Fabi returned with 5 of her siblings, the next Sunday she showed up
with 10 of her cousins, and before we knew it, we were gardening
every Sunday morning with some 40 young neighbors. Soon, we were
swimming in lettuce and chard, tomatoes and green beans, zucchini and
kale.
Andrés – my
running mate - was all of three when he joined his three siblings -
Morocho, Morocha and Pelona - those first Sunday mornings. I worried
that he would just be in the way at such a
young age, but far from it,. Each Sunday Andrés found a task to
take on and set forth with unflagging determination and order. Often,
his focus was the compost pile. Like a one-man army of ants, he spent
hours carting buckets and buckets of materials to help it grow:
leaves, sticks, weeds, peels, sheep poop, hay.
He seemed to innately understand that this – a pile of discarded
rotting objects, would become the key to our food, our lives.
Before long,
teachers and community leaders were asking the kids to give workshops
to share their pretty successful and unique techniques. Inevitably,
Andrés offered to take over when the explanation of our compost
system came its turn.
In our farming
collective our leaders are quite simply those who work the hardest.
The kids themselves decide who should be a “guia” , which
basically means you have to do a whole lot more work
than everyone else.
In our country of
Venezuela, our leaders have been chosen by elections. All of a
sudden, eight months ahead of schedule, a snap presidential election
has been called, by the president. Causing everyone who is not
the president to shuffle a bit. It’s a bit hard to get a
presidential campaign together in a few weeks.
(Personally,
I would be all for just calling forth those who just work the
hardest like our guias of Conuco Colibri, but of course, that never
works in politics.)
And so, that leaves
one big problem. No one wants to run against the president.
Some say because no one can beat him. Others say because the rules of
the race are set by him and for him. But, no matter
what, it’s become an embarrasing problem to find at least one
running mates to make it look like a real election. An obscure
evangelical pastor just stepped forward, but he so unknown and so
scandal-clad
that it´s a stretch to get him on the ballot.
And,
listen, he has the cutest little doe eyes
that would look fabulous on bilboards.
He’s got my vote. Andrés
for President.
