As the old man’s cayuco nudged up alongside AVENTURA,
I sensed that there was something different about him this morning, but I couldn’t
quite place what it was. He greeted me
with a cheerful, “Hola, Capitan Ramon” which made me chuckle as I recalled our
first encounter from a few months ago.
At that time his severe hearing problems had led to a funny exchange as
I struggled to convince him that I was not “Capitan Rainbow” or Capitan Rambo.”
His visits were always a treat
because I never knew what he would try to sell or trade me. It could be a fish or a lobster or an octopus
or some fresh eggs or the mother of the eggs.
Today it was some “jonny cakes” - a sort of dense Indio bread vaguely shaped
like a hamburger bun. I bought a few and
as he passed them up to me I suddenly recognized what was different about him
today. He was wearing a watch! When
I playfully teased him about this, he explained that he had just gotten a job
as a caretaker or “watchee man” at an expat property. They had bought him the Timex and insisted
that he wear it. We both laughed when I
asked him what time it was. That’s because
instead of looking at the watch, he looked up at the position of the sun in the
sky - like a hundred generations of his ancestors had done before him.
