Hello Porterville and Beyond …

I've decided that my letters are too serious, so tonight I'm having a second mezcal while I write and our new CD player from Sam's Club is broadcasting Manu Chao, a worldly French group that sings bouncy tunes in Spanish to Afro-Cubano rhythms. As I type, I hear the words, "Me dicen 'Desaparecido' " - they call me gone, or they call me vanished.

Rereading that sentence, I realize I failed to include any humorous or even mildly witty observations. If you hang in there with me, perhaps after wading through yet more poignant insights about life here in San Pablo, Etla, we might find some humor yet. Vamos a ver, as we say - we will see. Let's take a tour through our day and see what we have.

To begin at the beginning, as the author of Genesis once said to a seminar of creative Biblical writing students (note the wry witticism), we woke early. We fueled ourselves on a crunchy breakfast product called Fitness Cereal topped with bananas and raisins the size of goat droppings (if you lived in the country, you'd know what I mean), washing down all that boxed healthiness with a newly discovered orange juice (más pulpa) that doesn't have the Tang-like quality so revered by other Mexican juice makers and a fresh pot of genuine Mexican coffee we bought in the sprawling downtown market two days ago, paying $4 dollars for 2.2 pounds, a kilo.

After a bit of constructive dawdling, we fired up our rented VW Pointer and headed down the dirt road to the highway, where we joined the inbound commuters. Camino al Seminario was muy tranquila this morning and the only incident of any note that I can report involved four turkeys and a skinny dog, who chose the moment of our passing to discover his vestigial alpha-ness and chase the foul-mouthed fowl (wordplay aficionados, take note) all of six or eight feet across the road before realizing not only the numerical superiority of his prey but also their substantial girth, testament to the value their owner places on them. I am sure the poor perro, upon discovering that a well-fed wattle is worth more in Mexico than any dozen of man's best friend, hauled his bony rib cage off to a shady corner somewhere to curse its fate for being born in Mexico rather than in Marin County, California. Too bad he doesn't know about the Philippines. He might have felt better.

We arrived at the gym without further incident, not counting the usual machismo dodge ball that passes for driving here, and signed up for a month's membership, $35 each. Life is cheap in Mexico. Health is not. (Aficionados of wry observations, take note.) The gym is named Calypso and is very Mexican in its choice of form over function. It looks like an American gym, it charges the price of an American gym, it sells large jars of magical, muscle-building powders like an American gym - too bad the equipment is falling apart and the temperature inside the "air-conditioned" weight room is about 95 degrees (at 8 a.m.) But, we paid, we lifted, we sweated, we drank several kegs of water and we left, saying to ourselves on the way out the door, Hey, that was better than the last time. And it was. To live is to adapt. (Aficionados of curt pith, take note).

We had an appointment back at the house with Enrique, KT's godfather, and a couple of his crew members to deal with some pending issues (lack of water, etc.) so we headed straightaway out of town, stopping only to dash across the street to buy the local newspaper, Noticias, for 60 cents. Life is cheap in Mexico. Information is not. (Aficionados of wry observation, op. cit.) The lead story, which I read most of while waiting for a light to change, reported on how a quasi-public agency allegedly defrauded about 100 local campesinos (farmworkers) who had paid $300 to $400 apiece for the opportunity to be transported to the United States to work in the fields there. The agency took their money and took them for a ride, but not to the U.S., apparently ripping each of them off for the equivalent of six or so weeks of laborer's pay, blaming their misfortune on the war in Iraq.

(Speaking of battles, returning up our road no evidence could be seen of the earlier cross-species canine-fowl confrontation. Either peace - or pieces - prevailed.)

At home, we pulled laundered clothes out of our dependable Sears washer (Aficionados of romantic moments, take note; this was our first washing in our house) and hung them out to dry on the green clothes line Paul, our former tenant, had strung web-like across one side of our terrace. We have a clothes dryer that we bought a year ago in a knee-jerk of Americanism (have washer, need dryer, right?), but it has never been used. In a climate so dry that not even spilt milk is cried over because it evaporates before the first tear can fall, a gas-heated machine to fluff your undies does seem a bit unnecessary.

As I clipped the last pair of my jockies to the line (since you're asking, No, I let KT hang her own dainties), Enrique pulled up with his electrician, Ramiro, a sly-eyed klepto who will remove anything from a construction site that isn't cemented down, and Isidro, a wizened, weathered crew boss of indeterminate age, diminutive stature and signature straw hats who I'm sure belongs to a secret society of Mexican bubbas whose members meet weekly to chortle over the latest distress imposed on their clients. Today's topic: Water and the delivery from the ground to our showerhead thereof. Fear not, we are not wandering down the road of home repair minutiae. I have learned from your apprehensive expressions and long silences after sent emails not to venture there. Suffice to say, we have a well, we have a cistern, we have indoor pipes and faucets. Too often they behave more like the U.N. Security Council than a plumbing system. Whether peace will arrive in the Mideast before all our pipes just get along remains an open question.

After an hour, we all agreed in various versions of our native languages on a fix-it plan, one that did not include Ramiro's first remedy for rewiring the pump from the well to our house - just tap into the neighbor's electricity. Then the fun began. Our well is located a about a hundred yards downhill from our house next to the creek. You can walk there, as I did with Isidro, climbing over a fallen bamboo fence, negotiating some creaky barb wire and slithering delicately through a thicket of espinas, spiny native trees that are the only flora goats find inedible, apparently because one bit would turn their tongue into a colander, or you can drive via a crude dirt road, as Enrique and Ramiro did - or tried to do.

Isidro and I arrived at the well in a timely, and unbloodied, fashion and then quickly exhausted our interest in each other by removing the well's splintery wooden cover, dropping a couple of pebbles in, confirming in a manly, knowing way that, yes, there is water below, discussing the wasps that had set up housekeeping in the rusting metal box that holds the switch to the well's pump and, increasingly, wondering what in the name of Emiliano Zapata had happened to Enrique and Ramiro. Moments later, the pair of them appeared - on foot. Where's the truck? I asked. No se cabe, Enrique answered - it wouldn't fit on the road. Something's not right, I thought, because I've driven down the road myself, which, by Mexican standards, is first-class dirt. But we weren't there to talk trucks and after a long discussion about the well we decided to build a small cinderblock shed to cover the wiring. Ramiro even got the pump working again by grabbing a couple of loose (hot) wires and shoving them back into the grid.

The three of them then moved their Spanish into a higher gear and left me behind in monolingual land. Enrique started walking back up the hill and Isidro and Ramiro began pulling long planks of lumber from the remains of a nearby collapsed tin shed. They told me we needed wood for the truck, and although I still wasn't sure what that meant, I pitched in. The lumber was rotted, crumbling to the touch and, on its cool, ground side, residence to creatures so creepy and crawly that even Maurice Sendak's spine would surely shiver at their sight.

With my first grab, the wood greeted me with a palmful of splinters. The damage done, I continued and eventually found two medium-length four-by-fours that met Isidro's approval. He had two longer ones himself, which he hoisted over his shoulder. My wood weighed at least 50 pounds. His was clearly heavier. Isidro is maybe 55 or 60 years old, about 5-foot-3 and thin. As we trudged up the road, he spied a long metal pipe about the size of a 45-pound Olympic bar you might see in a well-equipped gym. He bent at the knees, balancing the wooden beams across his left shoulder, reached out with right hand, grabbed the bar, straightened and continued onward. I followed, looking at this little, strong man, his back curved under the weight of the timber, leaning into the hill as he climbed. It was a moment in a lifetime of manual labor, a continuum that began decades ago with a load of bricks or a bucket of cement and will not end until Isidro's body shouts, Ya, basta! Enough, enough!

In a few minutes, we rounded a curve and there was Enrique's big Ford truck, nose downward, 45 degrees across the road, its hood hard against a telephone poll and its right rear wheel, the drive wheel, suspended uselessly in the air. It is difficult to turn left into this side road from above because a sharp embankment separates it from the main road. It is easier to drive past it a bit, do some back and forths with the car, then turn. Enrique just went for the left and tipped precariously over the road cut. The truck lost traction and here it sat.

Here was Plan 1: Use some of the wood and a huge rock as a fulcrum and lever to raise up the truck, then shove the remainder under the suspended drive wheel to give it something to grab. And that's what we did. Ramiro and Isidro, applying all their weight to the heaviest of the beams, managed to lift the truck a couple of inches and I slid two boards under the wheel. We smiled. We were men. We overcame nature. Enrique got in the cab, turned over the engine and slipped it into reverse. The fat rubber rear tire spun furiously on the wood, its tread seeking a grip and then, just as the truck lurched backward, the rotting lumber shred into thousands of splintery pieces that shot out from under the truck like miniature arrows from a legion of archers. One of them protruded from a spiky cactus that stood on the side of the road. I reminded myself to not stand there when we tried again.

Here was Plan 2: Move the fulcrum and lever to the uphill side and shove the truck sideways, crablike, until the critical wheel was on firmer ground. Isidro lay flat in the dust and positioned a large, round stone under the suspension, we forced a 10-foot beam between the stone and the frame of the truck, took hold of the beam from beneath and pushed upward. Again and again and again. Each time the truck moved a few inches. Each time the stone was repositioned, the beam reinserted. A half-dozen efforts, and we had forced the bed of the pick-up to the right a foot and a half. The rear wheel solidly pressed against the dirt. We smiled again, although not as much as the first time. We were still men. But we were not quite as sure we had overcome nature.

We were right to doubt our putative success. The truck was too steeply angled and its rear wheel squealed plaintively over its lack of traction even though Ramiro, Isidro and I jumped in the bed to weigh it down. Nature smiled. We were only men. (Aficionados of deep observations, take note).

There was no Plan 3.

But there was a gas truck. In our neighborhood, we use propane, which is sold in tall cylindrical tanks that look like something Hans Blix wishes he might have found in Iraq. The gas truck, an oversized pickup whose bed was crammed with upright cylinders, ambled by at a fortuitous moment. The driver had a thick rope. Two bumpers were connected and one snapped rope and a repair later Enrique's pickup was once again mobile. As he drove down the road to turn the truck around, I heard KT's voice. She was in front of our house in the street, waving her arms and yelling.

All this happened while KT had been at the house because we were having our cistern filled with water, which, like most other things in Mexico, arrives by truck, in this case, 10,000 liters at a time. The big water tanker had driven by while we messed with Enrique's truck and had by now transferred its contents to the 22,000-liter cement chamber located under our terrace. The cistern leaks and can't be filled completely but we have been unable to convince Enrique, who built it, that there is a problem. Now, fate smiled upon us.

I had walked halfway up to the house before I could understand what KT was shouting. "La agua esta bajando." The water is draining. I relayed the yell to Enrique and we all headed for the cistern. Sure enough, only minutes after being partially refilled, the water level had already fallen several inches. More ominously, the sound of draining water emanated from the interior of the cistern. We each took turns sticking our head into the dark chamber, but since the only illumination we had was a tiny Maglite I had brought from California we couldn't see the source of the leak. Among Enrique, Isidro and Ramiro, there was much clucking, inspecting and expressing concern and because the exterior walls of the cistern remained dry common sense was invoked and the judgment delivered that the leak had to be on the inside wall between the cistern and house - the worst possible location. (Aficionados of humor, take note. There is none here). So, in a week or so, after KT and I have engaged in a flagrant abuse of water - long showers, constant flushing, maybe even a car wash - cistern repair will commence. The pain you feel is in my wallet.

It is 3 o'clock by the time we adios Enrique, Ramiro and Isidro, thanking them profusely for taking the time to repair that which they built in the first place, and KT and I are starving. Anxiety makes my stomach grow fonder of food. We make colorful sandwiches of ham, stringy white Oaxacan cheese, tomato, avocado and spicy peppers piled between halves of fresh sweet bolios and eat rapidly. We both feel we made progress today with the house. Slowly, we are mastering its mysteries, adding function to its beautiful form. Mexico demands patience - and persistence. (Aficionados of geographic generalities, take note).

After lunch, KT went to bed with John Irving, the author (Aficionados of clever double entendres, take note) and I took a seat on the terrace, mountains to the front, drying laundry to the left, a New York Times magazine in my right hand. I worked the puzzle and watched the mountains, occasionally pulling them closer with a pair of binoculars we brought with us. A long way up the hill, three cows grazed. Way down below, a farmer and his two yoked oxen cut furrows in a cornfield. Far off in Viguera, the closest town, I could hear the scratchy announcement of a loudspeaker, but not the distinct words. For a fee, the local papeleria, a store that sells paper, pens and other low-tech communication tools, will broadcast your ad (Carmela esta vendiendo chiles, veinte por kilo -- Carmela is selling peppers today; 20 pesos for a kilo) or personal announcement. Most mornings, beginning about 7:30, it is possible to hear a taped recording of Las Mananitas (Happy Birthday) being sent out to Julio or Avelina or Pablo or somebody.

A fickle breeze blew, first warmly up from the valley, then coolly down from the mountain. I took down the laundry, remembering how my mother hung our family's clothes on white lines in our back yard in Rochester, New York. The lines sagged under the weight of the wet sheets and diapers, so we used long wooden poles notched at one end to hold them up, allowing them to catch the wind like the sails on so many yachts. Here I am, I thought, a half-century later, doing the same thing my mother did, without the diapers, of course. (I am not yet that old. Aficionados of potty jokes, note restraint). I pulled a folded T-shirt to my face and breathed deeply. When I was a boy, I would run between the rows of hanging sheets, their breezy movement creating a fluid labyrinth or dampness and the smell of, what, of detergent? Of the fresh scent of springtime, as the marketers say? Whatever the smell was, it was here in Mexico, in my laundry on the terrace. Home is where the memories are.

I woke KT (John Irving had put her to sleep) and we drove down the hill to Internet Kristian, a little shop that sells school supplies, sodas and computer time for a penny a minute. KT sent an email to a friend in Mexico City who has a connection with Telmex, the phone company, hoping he could pull that string and help us, and a dozen of our neighbors, get a phone.

We returned home in time for sunset, poured each a mezcal, broke out the cacahuates and took to the terrace once more to watch the thunderheads fade to black and mountains revert to shadow. We made two more decisions for the day - to have spaghetti for dinner and to pour a second mezcal.

I then began to write. (Aficionados of tidy endings, take note).

Cheers,

Tim