Iz Puta u Ixtlan;
(ovaj ulomak sam htjela staviti još prošlog tjedna,dok je knjiga bila kod mene, ali tko bi to sve prepisivao. I , naravno, na internetu ne mogu naći nego englesku verziju..., stavljam ovdje sve što mi u trenu čitanja zazvoni, -zasvira zapjeva i zapleše- :)))) )
....The party began early. The storekeeper's daughter put a record on the turntable and brought the arm down; there was a terrible loud screech and a high-pitched buzz and then came a blasting sound of a trumpet and some guitars. The party consisted of playingthe records at full volume.
There were four young Mexican men who danced with the storekeeper's two daughters and three other young Mexican women. The Yaquis did not dance; they watched with apparent delight every movement the dancers made. They seemed to be enjoying themselves just watching and gulping down cheap tequila.
I bought individual drinks for everybody I knew. I wanted to avoid any feelings of resentment. I circulated among the numerous Indians and talked to them and then offered them drinks. My pattern of behavior worked until they realized I was not drinking at all. That seemed to annoy everyone at once. It was as if collectively they had discovered that I did not belong there. The Indians became very gruff and gave me sly looks.The Mexicans, who were as drunk as the Indians, also realized at the same time that I
had not danced; and that appeared to offend them even more. They became very aggressive. One of them forcibly took me by the arm and dragged me closer to the record player; another served me a full cup of tequila and wanted me to drink it all in one gulp and prove that I was a "macho."
I tried to stall them and laughed idiotically as if I were actually enjoying the situation.
I said that I would like to dance first and then drink. One of the young men called out the name of a song. The girl in charge of the record player began to search in the pile of records. She seemed to be a little tipsy, although none of the women had openly been drinking, and had trouble fitting a record on the turntable. A young man said that the record she had selected was not a twist; she fumbled with the pile, trying to find the suitable one, and everybody closed in around her and left me. That gave me time to run behind the store, away from the lighted area, and out of sight.
I stood about thirty yards away in the darkness of some bushes trying to decide what to do. I was tired. I felt it was time to get in my car and go back home. I began to walk to Bias's house, where my car was parked. I figured that if I drove slowly no one would
notice that I was leaving. The people in charge of the record player were apparently still looking for the record - all I could hear was the high pitched buzzing of the loudspeaker - but then came the blasting sound of a twist. I laughed out loud, thinking that they had probably turned to where I had been and found out that I had disappeared.
I saw some dark silhouettes of people walking in the opposite direction, going towards the store. We passed each other and they mumbled, "Buenas noches." I recognized them and spoke to them. I told them that it was a great party.
Before I came to a sharp bend in the road I encountered two other people, whom I did not recognize, but I greeted them anyway. The blasting sound of the record player was almost as loud there on the road as it was in front of the store. It was a dark starless night, but the glare from the store lights allowed me to have a fairly good visual perception of my surroundings.
Bias's house was very near and I accelerated my pace. I noticed then the dark shape of a person, sitting or perhaps squatting to my left, at the bend of the road. I thought for an instant that it might have been one of the people from the party who had left before I had. The person seemed to be defecating on the side of the road. That seemed odd. People in the community went into the thick bushes to perform their bodily functions. I thought that whoever it was in front of me must have been drunk.
I came to the bend and said, "Buenas noches."
The person answered me with an eerie, gruff, inhuman howl. The hair on my body literally stood on end. For a second I was paralyzed. Then I began to walk fast. I took a quick glance. I saw that the dark silhouette had stood up halfway; it was a woman. She was stooped over, leaning forward; she walked in that position for a few yards and then she hopped. I began to run, while the woman hopped like a bird by my side, keeping up with my speed. By the time I arrived at Bias's house she was cutting in front of me and we had almost touched. I leaped across a small dry ditch in front of the house and crashed through the flimsy door.
Bias was already in the house and seemed unconcerned with my story. "They pulled a good one on you, " he said reassuringly. "The Indians take delight in teasing foreigners." My experience had been so unnerving that the next day I drove to don Juan's house instead of going home as I had planned to do.
Don Juan returned in the late afternoon. I did not give him time to say anything but blurted out the whole story, including Bias's commentary. Don Juan's face became somber. Perhaps it was only my imagination, but I thought he was worried. "Don't put so
much stock in what Bias told you, " he said in a serious tone. "He knows nothing of the struggles between sorcerers.
"You should have known that it was something serious the moment you noticed that the shadow was to your left. You shouldn't have run either."
"What was I supposed to do? Stand there?"
"Right. When a warrior encounters his opponent and the opponent is not an ordinary
human being, he must make his stand. That is the only thing that makes him invulnerable."
"What are you saying, don Juan?"
"I'm saying that you have had your third encounter with your worthy opponent. She's following you around, waiting for a moment of weakness on your part. She almost bagged you this time."
I felt a surge of anxiety and accused him of putting me in unnecessary danger. I complained that the game he was playing with me was cruel. "It would be cruel if this would have happened to an average man, " he said. "But the instant one begins to live like a warrior, one is no longer ordinary. Besides, I didn't find you a worthy opponent because I want to play with you, or tease you, or annoy you. A worthy opponent might spur you on; under the influence of an opponent like 'la Catalina' you may have to make use of everything I have taught you. You don't have any other alternative."
We were quiet for a while.
His words had aroused a tremendous apprehension in me.
He then wanted me to imitate as close as possible the cry I had heard after I had said "Buenas noches."
I attempted to reproduce the sound and came up with some weird howling that scared me. Don Juan must have found my rendition funny; he laughed almost uncontrollably.
Afterwards he asked me to reconstruct the total sequence; the distance I ran, the distance the woman was from me at the time I encountered her, the distance she was from me at the time I reached the house, and the place where she had begun hopping. "No fat Indian woman could hop that way, " he said after assessing all those variables. "They could not even run that far."
He made me hop. I could not cover more than four feet each time, and if I were correct in my perception, the woman had hopped at least ten feet with each leap. "Of course, you know that from now on you must be on the lookout, " he said in a tone of great urgency. "She will try to tap you on your left shoulder during a moment when you
are unaware and weak."
"What should I do? "I asked.
"It is meaningless to complain, " he said. "What's important from this point on is the strategy of your life." I could not concentrate at all on what he was saying. I took notes automatically. After a long silence he asked if I had any pain behind my ears or in the nape of my neck. I said no, and he told me that if I had experienced an uncomfortable sensation in either of those two areas it would have meant that I had been clumsy and that "la Catalina" had injured me. "Everything you did that night was clumsy, " he said. "First of all, you went to the party to kill time, as though there is any time to kill.
That weakened you."
"You mean I shouldn't go to parties?"
"No, I don't mean that. You may go any place you wish, but if you do, you must assume the full responsibility for that act. A warrior lives his life strategically. He would attend a party or a reunion like that only if his strategy calls for it. That means, of course, that he would be in total control and would perform all the acts that he deems necessary." He looked at me fixedly and smiled, then covered his face and chuckled softly.
"You are in a terrible bind, " he said. "Your opponent is on your trail and for the first time in your life you cannot afford to act helter-skelter. This time you will have to learn a totally different doing, the doing of strategy. Think of it this way. If you survive the
onslaughts of 'la Catalina' you will have to thank her someday for having forced you to change your doing."
"What a terrible way of putting it!" I exclaimed. "What if I don't survive?"
"A warrior never indulges in thoughts like that, " he said. "When he has to act with his fellow men, a warrior follows the doing of strategy, and in that doing there are no victories or defeats. In that doing there are only actions."....
Post je objavljen 30.06.2015. u 22:40 sati.