Village life in Andalucia

The foothills of the Sierra Tejeda, where we live,  were this morning kissed by rain. I can’t remember the last time we had rain. March I think, or perhaps April. Last year we had tormentas (storms) from the beginning of September. This year it’s nearly December and – nothing.

Plumes of smoke that rise in the early morning or sit like flat cloud vapour across the valleys are one of those icons of autumn that signify the annual pruning of the vines and the general clearing of the annual agricultural rubbish. This year hill farmers impatient with the seemingly endless drought,  have begun the annual burn without waiting for the annual downpour – that insurance against hill fires that if they caught hold of the dessicated scrub would threaten everything.

Well, trial by water has spared us from trial by fire. We drove through spattering rain this morning into torrential rain, to the point where we could not see our hand before our faces and had to pull the car over.

Everyone in the village is relieved. It’s as though we had all, individually and collectively, been spiritually constipated. As though syrup of figs and suppositories had been ineffective for months and then, just when we had all forgotten about it and had unconsciously resigned ourselves to a life of bloat, blessed relief !

Everyone is unaccountably smiling!

I bought twenty little chard plants, twenty lettuces and a dozen asparagas seedlings that will crop in three years, so you can understand that after this long parched drought, I am once again a man of faith.

I raise a glass of pure water to you, water that is the fount of life, and trust that you will do the same for me!

Salud!