A Day of Drinking

Monday was once again a beautiful day, not a cloud in the sky, sun so hot I was sweating just sitting in the shade. In the morning Sandro's friend Daniele rode up the drive on his motorcycle/scooter (don't really know what to call it, all I know is that it was unnessarily large for transporing one small man from place to place. Although maybe bigger is better. If he runs into any cursing, cigarette smoking car drivers en route, he just might survive on his hummer of a motorcycle). Anyways Monday was the auspicious day that I met my first gigolo/pimp. I mean a real life gigalo. I guess its not so strange in Rome because after explaining his job description in broken english, he then declared proudly that his girlfriend was five months pregnant with his daughter Sophie. I might have let escape an audible yell and a few choice words reserved for those times when all other words fail me. I peppered him with questions. "is your girlfriend ok with that", "what about your daughter" and things along those lines and Im pretty sure he understood about 5% of what I was saying because all he did was life. Well, whatever makes you happy I guess. We ate a delicious pasta dish accompanied with my favorite red wine and then all piled into the blue van for a trip to the bar. It was three in the afternoon and the drinking was already beginning. Sandro ordered a cold glass of grippa for me...mmm my favorite and when I alternated sip by sip from water to grippa, both Daniele and Sandro scolded me and told me I was ruining the liquor. Damn. I thought I was being sneaky. Its hard to describe grippa...it falls between whiskey and vodka (in strength and taste) so just picture me sitting in a bar, broad daylight, sipping the strongest alcohol ever made, wincing and slightly gagging with each taste. Perfect. To mitigate the burning taste of liquid death, I was treated to gelato and the creamy ice cream cooled off my smoking belly. That night, in the waning sunlight, Sandro and I rode the tractor to the nearby field where we filled up on fresh manure for his crops. As he used the smaller tractor to move all the horse shit, I climbed onto the roof of the tractor to listen to the sounds of chirping crickets and heavy machinery doing everything that man can not. On our third trip to the sweet smelling refuse (yes, I actually love the smell of manure), Sandro taught me how to drive the tractor and with shrills of laughter I clumsily, and slowly filled the tractor with enough manure to drown in. As we drove through the crops, the manure filled wagon assaulted the field, catupulting chunks of shit as the army of chickens followed in its wake. It was beautiful really. Riding on the tractor and looking back to see the setting sun, and chickens dodging the onslaught of deadly shit. That night I went for a run to the next town over and I returned to the sounds of 70s funk and reggae beats and Sandro banging away on his drums. I grabbed myself a glass of wine, took a seat and began playing a moroccan handrum, playing along with music fit for disco parties. We played for a long time, silent except for the drums, music consuming our souls as the man in the moon watched with effervescent wonder. After our musical hunger was sated, I retired on my bed of tarp and blanket and fell asleep under the watchful gaze of the luna.