The Storm (28 page)

              “Yeah, Samantha came by to check on you. She said you didn’t look well earlier.”

              “Yeah, getting shot at will do that to you.” I was being pretty dry and a touch sarcastic. Stacy gave me a little kiss on the cheek to remind me that whatever emotions I felt toward Samantha right now, I needed to leave them at the door. “What else did she say? Nana and Miller make it back?”

              Stacy stood up and walked over to grab her wattle bottle and took a sip from the coffee table in the middle of the floor. “They are planting the seeds right now. I think she was trying to get the whole community out there. She mentioned everyone will be down in the areas around the pool.”

              They are planting already? It didn’t make any sense. Perhaps I was still half asleep or we were more desperate than I realized. I wasn’t a professional gardener but knew a lot more about it than most of these folks. We could still have another freeze, and some of these things required specific conditions to thrive. I couldn’t just sit here resting and hope for the best. “I have to get out there and help.”

              “Josh . . .” She was trying to tell me something that made absolute sense but my mind was already made up. “One more shovel won’t help that much. You’ve done enough for everyone today and need to rest.”

              I was already standing, gun in hand again, and walking toward our front door. I would need to lace up my boots and get moving. “Stacy, some of those plants are delicate. They can’t just throw a thousand seeds at the ground all over and expect to get a harvest. It takes a lot more than that. I need to go see what they are doing.”

              With that, she knew I was going to be stubborn and Stacy gave me the nod of acknowledgement. It was passive and supportive at the same time. Moments later, I was back outside and headed for the pool area, gun in hand and tired but steady, just like a sailboat captain who has survived a few storms and sees another one fast approaching.

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              Daylight continued to permeate the neighborhood as I walked briskly toward the field around the pool. I should be a part of whatever they were doing. Yeah, Samantha came by, and I was asleep, but it didn’t matter. Most people thought their food came from aisles three and four at the LeapMart and didn’t explore beyond that. We all intrinsically knew deep down that sustenance came from farms, a profession that society scoffed at, but it was something nobody thought they would ever immerse in besides a quaint summer visit to the county fair. I at least had a summer garden with some childhood experience at farms. Generally people bought some upside-down tomato plant to hang from a bannister and give themselves a pat on the back that they had grown anything at all.
An upside down-tomato plant, what a stupid idea,
I reflected.

              I cleared past a few homes and took a shortcut through a few people’s yards. Normally I would have only passed this way if the kids were with me and we were going to the pool in the summer. Little Tabitha hated walking through the grass when she was excited to swim, and Stacy didn’t relish carrying Paul, so it fell on me. As I slogged forward, I couldn’t help observing the grass was starting to grow. Winter can be brutal and can revisit suddenly in this area like an ugly ex-girlfriend that you just want to go away but keeps reappearing. This past week had seen such a resurgence of cold, but it was now vanished just as suddenly as it had come. The cherry blossoms were now coming into bloom, continuing where they had left off a few days before when their announcement of spring had been stunted by the artic chill.

              Ahead I could see what looked like the whole neighborhood out together. In the antebellum south, whole villages would show up and work together to plant fields, build houses, and celebrate all aspects of life together. The cheerful vibe I could see at two hundred yards while I walked forward immediately struck me as being a similar societal outing. At first glance, all didn’t look so bad. The field possessed rows and appeared like every square inch of soil was already dug up and in use.

              Farming has always been about being in balance and harvesting nature. Just like with cooking good food, if you rush it, you will ruin it. Just enough sunlight, just the right soil, temperature, water, and tender loving care with a little luck. Growing your own food isn’t a nine-to-five job. It’s all day and night. It requires total ownership of the life cycle of food, from seed to plant, to harvest and then on. In short, each grain of wheat and piece of fruit is like a child and requires the farmer to protect it as such.

              I saw a few people waving from far away as I came into view and more heads popped up. Most knew me now, directly or indirectly and gave an acknowledgement of respect. Samantha was by the pool house, chatting with Rick and Roald. As flamboyant as ever, Rick was in a tight shirt that was neon green and Roald was in a white shirt decorated with a picture of a black man possessing overly large, puffy, red lips. Behind them was Nana conversing with a few people I didn’t know. I raised my hand in a wave of friendship.

              Samantha immediately waved back and gave me a smile that was either super-sized or exaggerated. I felt some eyes staring, maybe I wasn’t supposed to be here, but I couldn’t help myself. Forward I marched and suddenly realized I was stepping onto soil which was turned over and had just been plowed. I froze and spun around. In all directions of relatively flat land, the soil was dug up and had either been planted or was about to.

              “Hey there!” Wenda Alvarez caught me off guard from behind. “Every time you take a step, a little cucumber dies.” Her voice was filled with laughter.

              Suddenly I was mortified. The eyes were staring at me because I was being a moron and walking across the field that was just planted. Everyone was much further along than I realized. “Oh my gosh. Okay, I am going to retrace my steps backwards.” Slowly I turned and tried to step into the same dirt spots I had left, although I wondered if I was really doing more harm than good smashing the same spot a second time. Gingerly I made my way back to where the plowed field started as though I was tiptoeing through a minefield.

             
Squish!
My foot caught a muddy spot and slipped as I finally cleared the field. After regaining my balance, I turned around and surveyed all before me. The field stretched ahead a hundred yards to the pool house. Off to the left and right of the field, there were still people scattering some seeds and also chatting. Most everyone around looked dirty, like they had been on their knees and weren’t afraid to dig in with their hands. Several shovels and rakes lay around the outer edges of the plowed field.

              There were no tractors here nor plows pulled by oxen. This was a hundred percent human effort. Suddenly I realized that all this had occurred today, and it was a bit impressive. Maybe there was hope for our community. As I continued to survey the field, its scale suddenly condensed in my mind and the logical part of my brain began to assess my surroundings. My garden was micro, and I managed to pull some food from it yearly. Even on my best years, I could only hope to supplement meals with certain fruits and vegetables. My garden could maybe feed my family in totality for a week at most.

              This field before me was impressive, well planted, but hopelessly inadequate. First, what would we do if we experienced a hot and dry summer? Irrigation, other than carrying buckets of water, was basically non-existent. Second and more importantly, food takes anywhere from sixty to 180 days to be grown and to ripen. Last I saw, we had maybe a few days to a week’s worth of food. That’s quite a shortfall. I love baby potatoes too, but eating them out of desperation before they can grow isn’t a good long-term strategy. Third, even if we could manage to scrounge up food and wait for harvest time, this field wasn’t anywhere near enough. A farmer in the nineteenth century who knew his tradecraft could survive on an acre and a half. We had a few times that to provide sustenance for several dozen families. It was a math equation that didn’t balance.

              Looking around, I wondered how this was so impressively organized and finally my eyes took ahold of a man giving orders. Peter Doukas was probably an octogenarian by age, but he looked twenty years younger as so many Greeks do. His childhood in the Hellenic countryside was now an asset to the community. Greeks tend to have a few things they pride themselves on in life above all else. They love their food and wine, dance better than most people, see the potential in the world, fight vigorously against anything Turkish, and ultimately see themselves as experts in agriculture just as Frenchmen consider themselves experts in fine wine.

              Peter was too old to wield a shovel and dig up the earth on a large scale with everyone, but at least his expertise was something that we could make use of. He was skinny with white hair, and he was wearing gym pants that had zip-ups down around the shoes. Strangely I thought, he was wearing white sneakers but maybe his time in America had rubbed off on him. A fleece pullover covered his upside, and his bushy eyebrows with olive skin made him appear like a man with some virility despite his advanced years.

              “Check your shoes for seeds, please,” said Wenda. Her face indicated her level of seriousness, although it came wrapped in a smile.

              Quickly obeying her command, I looked down at my right foot and all I saw was a ton of mud mixed with some scattered grass and a few leaves. I lowered that shoe, rebalanced, and raised my left boot. It too was covered in mud but I did manage to pull a small twig from the middle between the rubber cleats that gave traction. “Looks all clear as far as I can tell,” I said back to her, kind of chuckling.

              Wenda was nodding in agreement when I saw Samantha across the field point off to the side and then use her hands to gesture I should go there and she would meet me. “Got to go see the boss,” came out a bit tersely, but Wenda smiled, and I started making my way on the fringe of this field toward where Samantha indicated. As I walked over to meet Samantha, I glanced back and saw a look of satisfaction on Wenda’s face. It was the same look of pride that was commonplace here today. Eyeing the planted field, most people felt they had just completed a great deed that would save them.

              Finally arriving near a patch of trees that hugged a gate to a backyard and the field, I met up with Samantha. She spoke first. “Josh . . . I didn’t expect to see you so soon after today. Your wife said you probably needed to rest awhile.” She finished it, leading into a pause as if to wait for whatever response I would provide.

              I was determined to keep down the emotions of everything that happened today. That was a conversation I could share with Stacy and nobody else. This volcano of emotions was effectively sealed from the outside world. Quickly my mind thought of something else and I was direct in my reply. “Impressive operation here today.”
A few pleasantries might break some ice,
I thought.

              She smiled a half grin and looked around as if to survey her own work and then finished her smile. “Yes, good thing for us we have our good Greek boy, Peter Doukas. He was asking me all week to start growing something.”

             
Give the pleasantries a moment,
I thought. “Everyone looks tired but content. I’m shocked we got this field plowed and seeded so fast.”

              “What choice do we have?” She shrugged her shoulders to add emphasis. “We need food for everyone and this gives us a chance at sustainability.”

              Suddenly, that word sustainability conjured images of solar panels and little baby ducks living in pristine conditions. It came across as a cliché of the pre
–
solar storm age, something that was important to those with money who wanted to buy organic products but not having anything to do with producing it.

              I was about to answer her when she spoke again, “You should have your kids out here. This is a good family event. You can teach them how to plant crops. Other than Peter, you are one of our “experts” here and probably could teach them a lot. I haven’t seen Stacy out much lately either.”

              The way she finished it gave me pause. I hadn’t realized she was observing us, but it didn’t really shock me.
Time to change the subject again,
I thought. “How long do you think this food with last everyone? A month or two? It won’t be ready for a few months, I imagine.” I was dry and cold, even if I didn’t want to be.

              She was looking at the field and not me, arms crossed against her chest. Her eyes never wavered. “You are probably right,” she allowed. “But again, what am I supposed to do? Look around, Josh. See the hope you helped bring by getting those seeds?” She pointed around the field and truly, most people were smiling and enjoying this newfound sense of hope. “We can’t survive if we don’t grow food. It may not be enough, but that’s a road we will walk down as a community.”

              I was about to reply something conciliatory and constructive when I heard it.
BOOM BOOM BOOM! CRACK BOOM BOOM!
Rapid gunfire sounds were spilling into the air from a distance. Samantha suddenly looked at me and for the first time, I had witnessed that her eyes showed fear. We both gazed east, toward the general direction of gunfire, and I noticed almost everyone around the field was either doing the same or already fleeing. The sound wasn’t close, but it was rapid, and there was a whole lot more of it.