What the eagle saw

It is common to see resident eagles gliding high over the village of Zhumir when the air currents are favorable; a cast of raptors scanning the valley floor flecked with grasses bearing swollen grain and wildflowers. It is a perfect landscape for hunting careless mice too busy filling their cheeks to notice the expanding grey shadow — a bullet train rocketing towards them, intent on spiriting them away. Although some may find it horrid, it is thrilling to watch. The silence is barely broken; a tiny squeak, the rush of wings against sun-dried grass, the return of stillness.

I am spending less time in Cuenca than I originally intended because most of my needs can be had within a three-block radius of the central square of Paute. Like Cuenca, the downtown streets are narrow; sidewalks and streets designed for foot traffic and horses, two modes of transport still frequently used in this quaint and lovely farming community. The pace of everyday living here is as delicate as the flowers surrounding the town in greenhouses like military outposts protecting the valley.

Clerks in the local tienda do not remember my name, nor I theirs, but they bag a flat of eggs for me when they see me coming. The elderly woman in front of me does, in fact, call the clerk by name; she tells her what she needs and walks away knowing her groceries will be delivered to her home by 3pm. Everyone wishes everyone well, and most linger a moment longer to ask after the family.

I still spend a considerable amount of time observing the world from my roost perched high above the beaten path. This morning, I watched a farmer from Chican descending from the ridgeline, stooped like a willow made of waist-high grass, carrying food for the cuy he raises that will soon be the centerpiece of a festive dinner table.

I can hear dogs in the valley, too numerous to mention by breed, sex, or even color, clamoring to defend the precious patches of farmland their owners taught them was their own. And I can smell the fragrant earth; row upon row of fresh turned soil surrounding seeds of corn, beans, and squash.

There is lightness in people’s step now that the drought is over. Everyone is busy again planting seeds, pinching back fresh shoots and tilling weeds. All those bothersome mice and birds that squatted for months have learned its time to skedaddle. The comfortable sheds that protected them during the drought are now abuzz with busyness, so off they go into the fields of grassland gorging themselves with seeds, ecstatic to be among such riches and under a beautiful sapphire sky with only a few tiny specks of grey clouds headed their way.