...becalmed forever...
...in Kritsa...
A perfect auburn morning with one thing left to do.
Quickly, I dress and cross the street to search for the lane that leads to the track that leads to the road that I see from our balcony. The road that climbs and climbs the steep mountain on our left. I know it winds into the clouds but the boy in me wants to know where it goes after that.
Through the abandoned churchyard conscious of my noisy crunch then along the track that lifts through some low-flying daddy-longlegs up past what appears to be a box on wheels powered by a 354cc Honda lawn-mower engine - Mother of Zeus - how I'd love one of those! Suddenly I'm walking on asphalt, and walk and walk I do - high above the village.
I pass a goat, suddenly shy, tethered to a fence, then a man with a bulky sack resting on a bench; and a widow lady waiting for the lift coming up behind. And still I tramp and tramp. My calves complain. My breath is loud and harsh in the resin-scented air but it's intoxicating. I meet a flowering cactus, tall as a man, and wish him 'good morning' and smile, and again to a girl in bright, patterned dress humming her way back down town. The last roadsign's behind me, the one with diagonal line, and before I can catch my breath, I'm there. I turn. The village is lost from view. Almost without thinking, I step off into the air and float above the bluff and the gorge, its escarpment and crevasse - and still below me the road tracks on forever.
But my mouth is dry and I can hardly swallow.
I come down to earth with some sort of sense of achievement because at last I know the truth. The road never ends. It has been tempting my curiosity since I was a child and now, with winged feet and some strange giddiness, I float down over slopes and terraces, through squashed passageways of neatly cramped, wondrous homes where, although still very early, morning chains release another churning day.
I stride on past jumpy, cautious cats and straggling, grumbling chickens with their own peculiar smells. Fig and orange and lemon trees, rose bushes, apricot and vine. Poppies carpet the olive groves and bay and basil, rosemary and thyme, parsley and elder go mad all over. Doves fall through the air for fun, sparrows chirp and chatter and the air is filled with the screaming of swifts and sparrows below the patrolling lammergeyer and somewhere a cockateel squawks in all that crazy consciousness.
It's just nature in a fluttering, never-ending flow.
We sit at a table on the pavement outside the bus station kafeneio and chat to the lady proprietor's daughter, Nyfoula, until she leaves for college. The air glitters and smells of leaves. For her the village is spiritual and will keep its honour always. And it is true this mountain has moments of deep peace and tranquility, as well as delicious cheese and ham toasties and really amazing, satisfying frappes for breakfast.
Across from me a lady peels almonds into a basket. The older men who sit and argue over their coffees are well-dressed in the main, no careless 'anything-will-do' for them here. Clean, open neck shirts, pressed trousers of a gentlemanly antiquity, polished shoes and respectable v-necked pullovers when it's too cool for old bones.
We give up trying to identify the dozen or so different shrubs and trees that stand in Melina Merkouri plateia and when Nyfoula leaves, wishing us a safe journey, our conversation fades to thoughtful pauses till I spot our romany lady neighbour shopkeeper and ask if I might take her photo. She has the strong beautiful features and dark steady eyes that you see in the bust of Rodanthi. She isn't very enthusiastic but lets me anyway.
And then the bus comes.
But just as we climb on board, I see the man who told me how to use the welltap - and from across the street he
calls, "Don't forget your bottle, my friend."
Momma and Maria each gave us 'going-away' presents of lemonade bottles of raki, "For your journey". Maria's mother lets me embrace her - it's like kissing a loving cactus.
Now the airport...there's a five hour delay before our flight...we don't mind and take it as an unexpected extension to our visit...ten hours since we left Kritsa but then ...all is peaceful in the orchard...
In Kritsa we found a way of being still, of slowing down, being becalmed and this led us into the true spirit of these generous people; of sharing in their kindness, their laughter; their optimism; of going with the flow of time and facing the future with equanimity.
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