Papa

With grandsons, waiting roadside to sell his peas.

Juan Rafael is in his eighties. When Trujillo was President, he marched 20 kilometers every morning before breakfast so he wouldn’t be executed. He remembers when the highway was just a mule trail and when plastic bags didn’t exist. He made it through the 3rd grade, never learning how to read, before he began working the field.

When he walks into the room he is given the respect that all elders here deserve, “Blessings, Papa.” In return he asks God to bless us and, like his wife, has prayed the rosary every single evening of his life. He is half blind now, without the money to operate on the cataracts that whitens his right eye, but that doesn’t stop him from beating me at dominoes every afternoon.

As I am sitting here typing, Papa is sitting at my side, looking out at the land he has worked his entire life. Every once in a while he glances in my direction, examining my shiny silver laptop and matching external hard drive.

P: What’s that light? The battery?
D: Yes.
P: So if you shut it, it turns off?
D: Yep. Like this. (demonstration)
P: How many batteries does that thing take?
D: Just one. It recharges with the light (the word commonly used for electricity).
P: Wow.

This Marines hat is his work hat. His dress cap is a Yankees one.