I saw the clouds forming over the mountains to the north-east, and wanted to get away from Jocuixtita early, in the hopes of reaching Verano before I was caught by the afternoon rains which promised to come early. But last minute patients kept arriving, one after the other, and it was nearing 11:00 by the time I got old Hormiga saddled and ready to go. The “camino real” over the high pass between Jocuixtita and Verano was said to be completely sanjonado (washed out) by the rains, and I decided to go via the less used trail which passes the beautiful and recently abandoned rancho of Higuerrita. As I had only been over this trail once before, and remembered the maze of forks and cross trails connecting with it, I expressed uncertainty, and 13-year-old Josué Valenzuela offered to guide me to the ridge top.

The slope, which had been leafless and parched when I had last traversed it in March, was now a verdant tangle. There were many species of plants I had overlooked. Josué explained to me that a prevalent small tree with delicately scalloped compound leaves, called Copalillo (Bursera sp.) is used to cure asthma, a tea being brewed from the bark. A tall brushy plant with sleek, laurel-like leaves, called Jarilla, is excellent for firewood, burning well even when it is green. And a small white-flowering species of Lantana, called confite blanco would, in August, produce numerous white fruit which the villagers of Jocuixtita will gather by the liter, grind on the metate, and use to make gordas.

Josué accompanied me to the top of the ridge overlooking Verano, pointed out the course of the narrow trail as it wound its way down the mountainside, and bid me farewell. As we were parting the first drops of rain began to fall, and I put on my poncho, spreading it over my cargo as well. The rain at first fell lightly, and was refreshing. Hormiga wound her way down the mountainside among the oaks, reaching out here and there to chomp at the delicate, freshly sprouted grass. Her pace slowed as she did so until she came to a complete halt. I had to remind her frequently with a cluck or a swat on the backside, of her man-given duty.

A third of the way down the mountainside, as I was approaching a recently planted cornfield, a blue-clad figure came hurrying in my direction, hailing me. This was 68 year old Esteban Sanchez, who insisted I stop for lunch at his “casita” before continuing on my way. I was eager to get to Verano before the rain got heavier, but Esteban’s insistence was irresistible, and I followed him across the sprouting field to his home. The homestead was comprised of three small structures, with walls of closely-spaced poles and with roofs of grass thatch. The smallest building was the troja or corncrib, the next largest for the family, and the largest–but still not large–was for the storage of fodder and for pigs, of which at present there was but one.

Arriving at the hut, Esteban introduced me to his young wife Juana and three small daughters ages 6, 5, and 4. Like Esteban, Juana is trigena (wheat-colored), has a round face, an impish, upturned nose, and a figure which makes her look perpetually overdue. “I hear you visited my homeland”, she said, and so it was that I found she is the younger sister of the músico Pedrillo, next door neighbor of Goyo’s family in Las Chicuras.

Juana is Esteban’s second wife. Formerly Esteban lived with his first wife in Coyotitán, where he raised seven children. He also started a small store which in time became the most successful in the village. Then one day without warning he left the shop, his wife and his daughters, and made his way to Verano where, on the mountainside 1000 feet above the village, he built a thatch but and planted his corn and calabazas. He named the isolated rancho “Los Pinos” because of a pine-covered ridge back of the house, and lived there completely alone for nearly three years, grinding his corn on a stone metate, making his own tortillas, and hauling his own water. During the rains he brought water from the arroyo near the house but during the dry season had to had to go to a larger arroyo half a mile away. Then, some seven years ago, when he was 61, he met and married 23 year old Juana, whom he took to live with him in “Los Pinos”. Each year for the first three years they had a daughter and, then Esteban se secó (went dry). The girls, slender and alert, already are big enough to help Esteban plant and weed the corn fields beside the house, and to carry stones to the edge of the field. “A veces las pisan las brotas y a veces no” laughs old Esteban. (Sometimes they step on the corn-shoots and sometimes not.)

Juana, as she worked the stone mano back and forth over the metate to make tortillas explained to me how relieved her husband was en la barriga (in the belly) since I had given him medicine. Esteban had first come to me some months before in Verano with a weathered piece of paper dated 1942 in Mazatlán, documenting a stool analysis positive for amoebae. Typically, Esteban’s treatment had been inadequate, and for the last 24 years he had been suffering from amoebiasis of the liver, with chronic headaches, loss of appetite, and, more recently, with spells of incapacitating pain in his abdomen. I treated him with chloroquine, entrovioform, and vitamins, and now his pains had disappeared and his appetite returned.

As we lunched it rained harder and harder. The downpour made the daylight wane, and the air turned cold. For lack of warm clothes or anything to do, the three little girls curled up under the burlaps on the single bed and went to sleep. Gusts of wind carried sprays of rain into the hut, and there was no escaping them, as the narrower stick walls were only eight feet apart. Yellow-brown puddles formed in the rough dirt floor. I shivered in my damp tee-shirt. I had neglected to carry a jacket with me, as the temperature had been stifling in Ajoya below. The thatch roof began to leak here, there, and at last everywhere. No one minded. Things could be dried in the sun the next morning. Juana put buckets under the major leaks, not to prevent puddleing, but to obviate the trip to the arroyo for water. Esteban noticed that the pumpkin seeds which hung in a half-gourd from the low roof were getting wet, and as he had already planted all he was going to for that season, we decided to make a feast of what were left. Juana built up the fire and spread the seeds on the 50-gallon drum lid above the flames. When the seeds were “bien tostadas” she scooped them into a wooden bowl and we began to crack and eat them—a slow and painstaking process tolerable only on a rainy day in a leaky hut. For two hours we shelled and ate pumpkin seeds, and talked.

Finally the rain slackened to a drizzle, and I began to think of continuing on my way. Esteban, however, pointed out that not only would the trail be muddy and slippery, but that the arroyo would probably be too flooded to cross. He suggested that I spend the night, and I agreed.