Daniel A. Durgin
English 1B
Professor Taylor
14 July 2000
Reminiscent of the Rain
Before we knew it, the clouds let loose and heavy rain began to try and beat us into submission. We quickly dug into the cliff side in order to conceal ourselves from the weather and any onlookers below. The ground was loose shale, and it only had to be cut into five to six feet before a depression was created large enough to conceal the three Marines and myself. We had the tent, radio, night vision, Doppler unit, and motion detectors unloaded, erected, and operating in less than an hour. It was two in the morning, and the truck that delivered us would not be back for twenty-four hours. We watched in longing as the matte-black pick-up drove off into the dark night. Within minutes all that remained was the faint red glow of the truck’s taillights and an alert notice on the Doppler unit. All four of us quickly crawled underneath the tent in a vain attempt to shelter ourselves from the stinging rain. After struggling in the darkness, each man sat aside the other and attempted to be content with the discomfort inherent in this awkward arrangement. Shale had been thrown helter-skelter across the top of the tent; primarily to conceal our location and secondly to prevent the wind from wiping our shelter like a sail. If anyone were to walk upon our location, all they would see would be a hillside with eight camouflaged legs growing out of it. Our legs paid the price, so that our bodies and surveillance equipment could be spared the torment of the rain and wind. We all sat there motionless, in complete silence, and looking off into the inky blackness that was Mexico – as were our orders.
In hours, which seemed like days, the rain letup and the sun began to rise; almost simultaneously the night vision began to wail. The Sergeant grunted, rolled over, and flipped the unit off. Our position on the hillside directly concealed the sunrise, but we where able to watch its effect as the valley floor came alive with streaks of light. The shrubs grew shadows a mile long, stretching out like the fingers of a blind man reading the valley floor like Braille. Trees began to appear, then small bodies of water, then finally a few goats and cattle became visible in the small ranches that were thrown throughout the lowland.
We sat there, cold, wet, and with our minds foraging for thought. Within hours after the sunrise the two Privates, who lay between the Sergeant and myself, were asleep. They looked like two brothers sleeping upon each other on a long family car trip. The Sergeant monitored the radio and I the Doppler Unit. Neither job required any effort, only alert ears, so we both reached into our field packs as quietly as possible. He retrieved a Hustler and a Snickers, I a copy of a book I hadn’t read since I was a child; at that instant I wished we could trade, however I didn’t think this 25O pound Samoan would be too receptive to “The Count of Monte Cristo.”
The book absorbed the humidity like a sponge, and to such a degree that I was able to press drops of water from its pages. As I read, the pages peeled off of the binding like the skin of an onion. Chapter one began like all beginnings – with a description. “On February 14, 1815, the watchtower at Marseilles signaled the arrival of the three-masted Pharaon, coming from Smyrna, Trieste and Naples.” As I read, my mind left Dantès world and began to reminisce back to my childhood.
1985 was the wettest year the town of Grass Valley had ever seen. That day in February, I was eleven years old and this historical storm was hammering the windows of my tutor’s house. I was a rather slow reader, and my mother and teacher feared it might inhibit me from succeeding in the next grade. Sue, my tutor, believed that the only way to read was to “practice, practice, practice.” We would sit there together for forty-five minutes a day. I frustrated, she smiling gleefully as I struggled through the daunting task of reading the biggest book I’d ever seen. It was four hundred and fifty pages; I hadn’t read that many pages in my life. Of all the books to pick, she chooses the one with words like “Signoti Francesi,” “Bonapartist’s,” and “Bartoloneo Cavalcanti.” Each page took me twenty minutes to struggle through and each page was more intimidating than the last. I sounded out a word, “Bone-pert-est,” and then looked to her face. Her gleeful expression changed to dismay and then back to glee again – ‘god that was annoying.’ I tried it again, “bona-pert-ist,” with the same response. Over and again, “Bonapartist,” as I looked up from the page, glee remained glee, and I continued. It took me three days to read the first chapter. When I finished, she made me read chapter one, again. My second attempt only took two days; I was improving. The third time took forty minutes, and so I began the second chapter.
I started the sixth grade that September, having spent the summer with my tutor reading chapter after chapter. School came too early and I was unable to finish Dantès avenging tale. However, that first week we began reading aloud from some book whose title I’ve long forgotten. As my turn to read aloud approached, anxiety filled my stomach; too much anxiety for someone of my age. The children seated in front of me read their chosen passage. My turn was upon me, and I began. I stuttered and stammered a little, as was expected of all the children. When I finished no one laughed, no one looked, and I was just a regular sixth grader.
The wet reality of my suffering on that hillside brought me back from my reflection. As dusk approached, the temperature dropped close to freezing. Soon, the rain began again, and promptly turned to hail, then to sleet. I was struggling to burn through the last few pages before complete darkness descended. The Sergeant was asleep, and the two Privates were playing spades on top of the radio. It had been quiet throughout the day. The rain tends to keep the smugglers and coyotes in the bars of Palomas. As I read, the characters consumed by Dantès vengeance were collapsing in melancholy and despair. I desperately struggled to peel away the remaining pages.
Darkness descended. The Privates scanned the horizon with the night vision goggles. The Sergeant confirmed a radio check. I sat there in the faint green incandescent light of the Doppler holding page four hundred and forty-one in my hand. The remains of the day pilled neatly in a mound of pulp at my feet along with the Sergeant’s Hustler. Again my mind retreated. Just ten short years ago this book allowed me to escape the humiliation of being held back in the fifth grade. Now it allows me to escape the harsh brutality of freezing rain and wind. The Doppler chirps and minutes later the red headlights of the truck could be seen climbing the mountain. The Sergeant and I climb outside of the tent, and the Privates started breaking down the equipment. The truck arrived promptly, and with haste the equipment was loaded. In the warm white light of the cab I quickly complete the book started ten years ago. In the peace of a few minutes, I found that “all human wisdom was contained in these two words: wait and hope.”
Works Cited
Dumas, Alexandre. The Count of Monte Cristo. New York: Bantam Books. 1979.
