My Story

# 26

The Padre’s house was next to a thick adobe wall that surrounded an old Dominican Church in the center of the village. The little kid ran up to the wrought iron entrance gate and started ringing a small bell that hung from a post. “Hey, that’s enough!” I told the kid, but he kept on, enjoying the license to ring a church bell.

Out of a side door of the church an elderly woman in a shawl and dangling some long prayer beads came up to us on the inside of the gate., “Yes?” she said.

We said we needed to talk to the Padre. With an expression that said, ‘Doesn’t everybody’?, she asked what our purpose was.

Rudi clapped his hands together (in prayer fashion) , raised them to his face and closed his eyes to show that we were looking for a place to sleep. She understood that part of his Spanish and got over to us that the Padre was teaching a class of catechism and wouldn’t be available for another hour or so.

“Should we wait?” we asked ourselves, thinking maybe there was another place in the village where we could find a bed before it got dark.

In time like these, when it came to finding a place to stay for the night, we never flipped a coin; we always relied on Rudi’s instinct. He claimed to have an intuition that could predict the nature of our luck before we set upon a venture. It was really not much more than guessing but I would humor Rudi with letting him have a go at it. Someone had to do the job. When he made a wrong guess, we’d forget about it. It made his percentage of correct answers look better.
“My gut feeling tells me we’ll have luck,” He answered, taking a seat on a wooden bench by the gate. Notice he didn’t say if it was going to be good luck or bad luck.
“I sure hope you’re right this time!” I said, “I’m so hungry I cold eat a horse.”
“Just hold on a little longer, and you’ll reach that middle stage of hunger where you’re not hungry for a while!”
I sat down on the bench by the gate with him and bent into a position that made my stomach smaller. “Ah! There I feel much better,” I groaned.
Rudi laughed, “You Americans just can’t take it!” He said. “You shield yourselves from real things until you’re like machines.”
Well, if he wanted an argument at this time, I was ready for him. “And why not?” I snapped back. “Why be uncomfortable when you already have the means to be comfortable?” I felt some new pains shoot through my abdomen as my stomach shrank smaller.

Rudi was ready to shoot back. “Because when you’re faced with a situation like you’re faced with right now, you cringe and become cowards. You look for some pill to solve the problem. Just like in the war; without all your money and supplies, you would’ve never been able to stand up against us, the Germans, or the Russians for that matter.”

I think Rudi was getting hungry too and wanted to take it out on somebody. He seldom brought up the war.
“What’d you expect us to use? Bows and arrows?” I said. “Who gives a damn how you win a war, just so you win it?”
And then I thought how we won the war against Japan. And then
I felt like shutting up.
“If you’re going to do a thing, do it right.” Rudi said.
“What’s that got do with war? Life isn’t a war!” I returned.
“It isn’t?” he asked.
And then a small middle-aged man in a long black cassock came walking up from the church side door.
We both stood up as he greeted us, “Good evening Padre,” I said. “My friend and I are touring the world on our motor scooter and we’re interested in meeting with a Spanish Padre and thought we’d stop in to see you. I hope you will excuse us if we’ve interrupted your catechism class.”
He understood my primitive Spanish.
“No, that’s quite all right, boys, I have one of my better students taking over the lesson. Won’t you come in for a while?”
We passed through a barren courtyard that looked like it could’ve used some flowers or grass or something. Come to realize it, all of Spain looked like that so far. It was so different from France and the other countries where you had flowers growing everywhere, and hedges and things.

We followed him to a one-story room in the corner of the walled courtyard. “Sit down, please,” he said, pointing to a small wooden table in the center of what appeared to be a dining room. My stomach made a revealing growling noise just as I sat down. I don’t think he heard it, what with the shuffling chairs and all.
“Do you like Spanish wine?” he brought out a large quart jug of church wine from a closet.
“Gracias,” we answered as he poured us each a half a glass of red wine. That was all I needed - - an appetizer!
He spoke some French, a little German, and naturally Spanish, and with that combination supplemented with scribbling pictures, we were able to talk with each other.
The customary poster of Franco was on one of the walls. On other walls were Jesus-pictures and bishop-looking people. And there was a depiction of Mary-mother-of Jesus on the front wall. We sat and talked about our trip; he was interested in learning how other people were living in other places. He was puzzled at first at the idea of an American and a German traveling the world together on a motor scooter. Often we had met people who had never seen nor talked with an American or a German before, but had formed opinions of them through hearsay. Generally these opinions were uncomplimentary, but once we had talked with people they saw for themselves that we had neither horns nor long red forked tails. We didn’t pose as ambassadors or anything like that, but we always left the family or village with a much better impression of Americans and Germans, usually, in most cases, I think.
He told us he had been born in Riaza, a small town to the north of Madrid, and had attended the seminary in Madrid for twelve years. He had come to the little village of Cogolludo and its eight hundred parishioners six years ago, and planned to remain there, the bishop willing, for the rest of his life. I guess he was about 50 years old. His mother, and also his sister and her husband and one daughter lived there with him also at the church in the rooms that bordered the wall of the courtyard. He called them out to meet us.

That was strange, but I guess it was the custom in that part of Spain, bringing your family along with you to live with you at the church. I can see why mothers would encourage a son to become a priest. She would always have the security of knowing she would have a place to live when she got old. She looked about 70. Come to think of it, I don’t remember seeing any homeless women or men lying around the streets in any of the big cities in Spain. I guess Franco had a building somewhere for them or just ‘eliminated’ them like he did his political opponents.
“You play songs on those guitars?” The Padre asked.
“Sure, wanna hear a song?” Rudi asked.
While we were tuning our guitars, a long file of young children passed the front gate, and we figured the catechism class was over. He invited them to listen in.
When we finished the three Spanish folksongs we knew, he had the children sing one of their school songs. It’s always fun to hear little children, boy and girls, sing a song together. It’s like listening to the fresh sound of a mountain stream flowing over some rocks through the woods. It doesn’t matter the language.
Rudi and I clapped and they smiled at our approval. He dismissed them; his mother and the family slipped away in the adjoining doors of the courtyard and we were left alone to talk with the Padre.
“Call me, Padre Juan,” he said, and I’ll call you Rohn and Rudi.
There was no post office in the village, and twice we were interrupted during our conversation while the Padre gave out mail to parishioners. He was the post office. Also, at one point he was called upon to administer first aid to a small child who had taken a fall in the street. The child’s mother had come to the Padre with her boy with a bruised and bleeding elbow. The nearest doctor was twenty-five miles away, and the villagers always turned to the Padre for medical help like this. I wonder what she would’ve done during the civil war going on twenty years ago. Even though times were tough for this village today, under Franco it must’ve really been miserable twenty years ago during the fighting. We often saw decaying wooden homemade crosses sticking in the ground along the highway commemorating somebody who lost their life at that spot.

The local community aided the Padre, too, by giving him a percentage of their grain crop each harvest, which he in turn sold to the merchants of the village or gave to the poor.
Anything that he mentioned that sounded like food made my mouth water. I was distraught with curiosity to know if he was going to invite us to stay for dinner. I tried to make our conversations as interesting as possible. This way he wouldn’t excuse himself to go to dinner. I was desperate for a meal. I think Rudi was too. I had never before seen Rudi make himself so charming. If the Padre wasn’t going to ask us for dinner, I had a plan. I was simply going to tell him we were poor, and ask him if he please would give us some of the grain that he gave away to the poor of his parish. I would eat it raw. Then I thought how silly that would be. It was only one day that I hadn’t had a meal. I had heard of people who had gone two weeks without eating and they lived. Certainly I could last longer than a day. Besides, I didn’t want to show Rudi I was a weakling.
I heard the rustling of pots and pans from somewhere. But I also heard gurgling from my stomach. I’ve got an unusually boisterous stomach when it comes to needing some attention. When I sensed its complaints coming on, I managed to clear my throat or cough a little.

“You have an allergy?” The Padre asked me.

“No, I don’t think so. It’s just that we’ve been sleeping in hay lofts at night time.” I answered. It didn’t hurt anything to give him a hint that we needed a place to sleep for the night.

Wonderful aromas from the kitchen seeped into the courtyard like a lovely woman. It gave me new vigor. I cranked up my conversation with Padre Juan, even more captivating and descriptive about our travels. The aroma from the other room was like receiving a second wind. I imagined the wonderful taste of chicken drumsticks cooked in olive oil and garlic; chopped up onions sprinkled with salt and a little white Spanish wine poured in and a touch of diced green peppers.

I couldn’t speak. I let Rudi do the talking. I sat back and in my head ran a flick of the best Spanish meal we had back when we left Barcelona on our way to Zaragoza and the mayor of the little village had invited us for lunch when we inquired for the road west at his house just before siesta time as his wife was about to put the main meal of the day on the table. He called it ‘arroz con pollo’. The senora served it on top of long grain rice and some diced tomatoes with chopped fresh parsley. We each had a wedge of lemon and were told to squeeze a little on top. “We don’t eat those,” the mayor said as I landed with a bay leaf under my tongue and tried to get it out. I set it on the plate. Rudi somehow found that hilarious.
Then at the tinkling sound of a little bell, the Padre stood up and said, “Won’t you boys join me in a meal?”
Rudi, in his most blasé manner, I mean really, really blasé manner uttered a quiet “Thank you.” It sounded like he almost didn’t want the meal. Like a starving cat that seems to retain its dignity all the way ‘till death, all he said was that “Thank you.”

I could see the Padre wasn’t sure what Rudi meant by his “Thank you.”

Padre Juan even made a gesture that I interpreted momentarily in a panic, to mean, “Well If you don’t want to eat - - wait here; I’ll be back in a half-hour.”
The Padre’s gesture might have been “Fine. Let’s all wash our hands before dinner.” I didn’t know for sure, but I didn’t want him to misinterpret Rudi at such a desperate time. I felt like I was at a poker table. This was no time for reading wrong intentions.
I interrupted him in a loud voice that surprised me, “Oh! Thank you, Padre Juan! That would be wonderful!”

Rudi gave me a wincing stare. I guess I shouldn’t have shown the Padre how much I really wanted something to eat. It was undignified, at least in Rudi’s way of thinking. He was a stickler sometimes, for that sort of decorum things. Once in France I had wanted to change my stained shirt for a clean one. We were in a town square, and he almost flew into a rage when I changed it out on the main street. He wanted me to hide behind a tree or go behind a building or somewhere.

But Rudi’s expression changed quickly. The knowledge of food on the table makes an irritable man human again. We followed Padre Juan to a white-washed kitchen, where his housekeeper, a woman named Silvia, the one who had come out to greet our bell ringing the first time, had prepared a setting for three on an oil-cloth-covered table.

Well, it wasn’t chicken but it was even better! She served huge portions of beef in a broth that had chickpeas, leeks, carrots and bubbles of olive oil floating around the top. It was scalding hot but I dipped chunks of the hard crusted bread into it and it cooled right down. I thought I heard my stomach say, “Thank you! Thank you!” When she offered me another helping, I held up my bowl without trying to look eager and let it linger as long as possible under her big ladle spoon. This strategy turned out to be not necessary at all, because after the stew, there came another course! She brought out a big pot and served us chicken and boiled potatoes covered with a steamy tomato sauce. The Padre poured us each a glass of white wine, and after two helpings of her “cocido,” announced the meal was over by offering us peasant cheese and fruit. Jeeze, was I full!. The skin over my belly was really stretched! I guess I was having a natural reaction. My body was telling me “Go ahead, eat a lot. You might not have another meal in weeks.”
I had never eaten so much in my life. I felt bloated. We sat and talked about our trip and our future plans. It was getting dark, and the Padre found our conversation interesting and lit an oil lamp. “Did you find the people of France much different than the people of Spain?” He asked.

“A lot different,” I responded.
“How?” He asked.
I wasn’t going to put us in a position where the Padre would ask us to leave if I told him how I really felt. I mean the nice dinner and all, and the nice hospitality, so how could I answer him? I couldn’t say, “Well, first of all, the people in France don’t have some dictator peering over their shoulder, watching their every move.”
I thought about it.
The mountains, the Pyrenees seemed to really separate those two countries like a big iron fence. The change in country styles wasn’t like going to Holland from Germany or from Belgium to France where the people looked pretty much the same. The countryside and the cities looked the same. It was something really different going from France into Spain.

Once we got into the interior of Spain, I felt like we were in a police state where everyone was in some kind of domestic argument with each other. They were suspicious of us and of each other. The kind of suspicion that often ends in feuds or bloodshed. I remember my high school buddy, Jim Carey, he went on to become a Maryland State Police Trooper and he said he always put on his bulletproof vest when he had to investigate a domestic violence case. They were always the bloodiest. In Spain, at least where we traveled, the people all seemed to be not living a free life. Not like in France, anyway.

And how was I going to tell him I thought the people we met were politically handcuffed? Even a child could see that. And the adults, they were all living under the watchful regime of General Franco that wanted to think their thoughts for them. I had heard about this happening in Russia and China and now I was seeing it actually in practice here in Spain. I could tell that because even in their homes where no neighbors were listening, if I wandered off with my conversation in subjects like the Spanish civil war, or the Americans or Germans who were fighting in that war, our host would shift the conversation to something else.

As far as Rudi was concerned, coming from a Nazi political regime that captured people’s minds for nearly a decade, he didn’t seem to sense the same oppressive system in Spain that I felt.
And it’s no wonder the Spanish people seemed so different to me. Living like that is not going to bring out the best in people.

I told the Padre about our experience in the village near Cogolludo and how we received a friendly welcome and how we left under a feeling of suspicion and how one guy seemed to provoke it all.

The good ol’ Padre was a gentle kinda guy, not very aggressive or anything like that. He nodded his head. He didn’t seem to be willing to pursue the topic. So anyway, I stumbled through the whole explanation of what happened and let him know how disappointed we were that it all turned out that way, even to the old woman asking us for money to sleep in the wagon in the shed.
I guess he didn’t want to let us go feeling the way that we did about the Spanish people, or at least those we had experienced here in the state of Aragon. “You see,” he began, “our order of Dominicans has learned much about human behavior and how to protect ourselves and our faith during the centuries of our existence.”
That kinda surprised me to hear him talking like that. He was sort of a closed-up person and not willing to share anything about himself or his Catholic religion.

He continued, “What I will say to you today does not come from me but from the teachings of our Dominican Order, from our learned scholars.”
Whatdahell…?? Is he going to give me some kind of lecture or something? I didn’t want to get a finger-waving scolding from this guy. Maybe this was the price we had to pay for dinner.

He went on with, “Centuries of teaching has shown us that if we expect to keep our flock, our parishioners, our faith, together, (he always seemed to lower his voice when he said the word faith) we need more than support from the papacy in Rome.”

Oh, I see what he was getting at. The Moors from North Africa and their Muslim religion had crossed over from North Africa in the 8th century and taken over most of Spain. I knew that from my high school history. Anyway, the Christians lost it. And they didn’t gain it back until the 13th century – almost 500 years. The Christians were not about to let that happen again.

“We need support from within our flock,” he said. “There is always the person within our flock I must watch out for. I need to detect who the ‘un-ordained’ leader of our community is. We need to provide that leader with the nourishment that such a person desires.”
I moved forward to listen to him. Maybe he was going to let me in on some secret Dominican set of principles that has allowed him to capture and hold his parishioners.

“We keep records on who we discern is such a leader. He is vital to our community of the faithful. If we lose his favor, we lose. If we control him through proper nourishment, we have much to gain.”
I wanted to ask him what he meant by ‘un-ordained’ and ‘nourishment’. But he was on a roll and I didn’t want to interrupt. I pretended I understood what he was talking about.

“Like with animals, this leadership is always vulnerable to change. We pay even more attention to this subject than to church matters.”

I asked, “You mean there’s such a person, right now, who is aware of our meeting with you? And taking notes, so to speak?”
He ignored my question, “You boys are going to visit a lot of different communities and countries as you travel. When you arrive at a community, you’ll want to get on the good side of that community as quickly as you can if you want things to go well for you.” He waved his hand, “Wherever your travels take you to, look for that special person, that un-ordained leader in each group or neighborhood of people you encounter. Learn to do this. As travelers, you must learn to do this. It’s important for your survival.”
He got me to thinking.

He continued, “After a while you’ll learn to quickly recognize him. As you travel you will find in every group of people, small or large, with humans, there will be a hierarchy of order. There is always the boss man. Just like a pecking order. It won’t always be who you think it might be or should be because of his title or his rank. It might not be a man, but a woman. If you learn to know this when you enter a new community of people, you will be more successful at getting what you want, --what you came there for.”
I looked over at Rudi and wondered at what Rudi was thinking. He wasn’t falling asleep. He didn’t look bored. So I guess he was taking it in.

I thought back at my army experience in Wuerzburg, and back in school in Maryland. It was always that way, sure. There was always the person you needed to go to if you wanted to get something done. And often it wasn’t the person, like a high-ranking officer you would normally think to go to. If it was an emergency, and you picked the wrong person, it would lead to disaster. You had to know who to go to. You had to be aware of this. Important things depended on it.

The Padre saw I recognized what he was talking about. Yes, your choice of a leader or a go-to person is easy to pick if you are living in an established community. You know who to turn to in each given situation. But who do you turn to if you are traveling like we were and you are faced with important decisions like this each day?

The Padre continued. “Through the teachings of our brethren Dominican order, passed down through centuries, we have learned how to make these decisions. I mention this to you because of the situation that you describe; you made an error when you did not separate out the decision-maker, the leader of the community you found yourself in.”

Hmmmm, I thought to myself. Yeah, that Miguel, and that Salvador. Those guys. That was a wrong decision. As it turned out, the Big Bad Bernardo guy wasn’t the bumpkin we thought he was. Yeah, he was vociferous and all but he had a cunning about him that proved to be our undoing. He ruined that whole experience for us in that little village. He must’ve had a bone to pick with Americans and Germans and he took it out on us. If we’d been smart enough to anticipate his spreading the word around the community that we were unwelcome people, we could’ve avoided being ostracized. But how were we supposed to do that?
I explained this to the Padre.
“The ‘how-to’ is something you will have to learn for yourselves.” He said. “I am bound by oath not to share the wisdom of my Dominican teachings. I suggest only that you be aware of what I am saying. It might save your lives as you travel on to where humans or animals rule the earth.
He continued. “The Holy Roman Catholic Church has existed since Christ because in its wisdom it has culled out the non-believers, those who would attempt to destroy the church. We must quietly discourage and destroy them. My parishioners are vulnerable to the workings of Satan and his followers.”
Jeeze, now we’re gettin’ into Satan, I said to myself.

He continued, in a nervous-quiet way. “It’s always a changing landscape, like a moving parade. I lose parishioners; I gain new converts. They continue to have new convictions and replace old ones. I must be able to recognize agitation or loss of faith.”
He was really chattering. He was cool. He sat there rigid, with one hand stretched across the back of his wicker chair and the other on his lap, fiddling with some rosary beads. We had touched a nerve with the ol’ Padre. I felt like I was in the confessional box, and he was the confessor. Confined like he was in this tiny village in the middle of a barren countryside and austere political state, he had to let it all hang out someway. He was safe. We were not a couple of strangers who would report his mutterings to the pope or to Franco or someone else like the archbishop who had him by his testicles.
“You are in the same position that I am constantly in,” he said.

“There are people in this community that I must cultivate. Each morning I wake up, I ask myself who the un-ordained person is. I pray for him, and I cultivate him. The people will listen to him. He must listen to the church. We know the method to make him listen.
He went on. “I cannot share with you our methods, but you must develop a skill for this if you want to survive this tour of yours. Right now you are developing the skill. Always be alert. I will pray for you.”
As I look back now, as we traveled, before we entered a town or community of sorts, I would always nudge Rudi and say, “Padre Juan.” Rudi knew what I meant.
The Padre stood up, still clutching his rosary beads, said “I will show you where you can sleep for the night.”

We said nothing.

We followed him across the courtyard and to one of the rooms with a door ajar, “Here are two beds; Silvia will bring you some sheets. Que duerme con los angeles.” (May you sleep with the angels)

The future didn’t look very bright to me. Our money was gone, my stomach was demanding better treatment. We were smack dab in the middle of a monotonous landscape that had all the moisture drained out of it.
In the morning, I tried to forget my woes at the pleasure of having another meal with the Padre. I filled myself with bread and fruit, figuring it would be the last meal in a long time.
As we were about to leave, the Padre asked us if we would like to attend his seven o’clock mass. We were in no hurry to head west. Besides, we were curious to see what happens inside a 16th century Spanish church.
The hot morning sun was already making itself known. The church was cool inside. We moved from early morning brightness into the shadowy interior. The church seemed immense, probably because the buildings we’d been in so far were small. There were few persons inside. Mostly women in black shawls. There were no pews. Only tall, looming columns prevented the wide tile floor from being completely barren. Its dampness reminded me of a dungeon, and it took me some time to adjust my eyes to the lack of light. In the church a few minutes, a strange feeling of sadness came over me. The somber-colored interior was devoid of any sign of cheerfulness.

A handful of aged women with gray faces moved awkwardly about on their knees. They were burdened with dark shawls and clothes in different shades of black. Their lips moved in slow, dismal movement. They neither whispered nor talked. It sounded most like the discourteous eating sounds that toothless old people make when they’re reading a newspaper.

On several walls I could see the figure of a dead man, tortuously hanging from a cross. It was Christ. Above the altar was a dominant statue of a pity-provoking woman standing on a snake in her bare feet. It was Mary, his mother.
Incense, and a compost scent of holiness, filled the air. The Padre, a different man now, began to recite a chant in B-flat minor. The old women repeated it in monotone. He didn’t seem like the same friendly person anymore. He looked like a mystic miniature dragon as he made motions with his arms through the heavy mist of incense.
I became afraid. The eyes of the Christ’s and Mary’s and Saints’ seemed to be leering in my direction. ‘You are wayward’ was their expression to me. Everyone seemed in the building seemed sorry. I felt like crying. I felt me and everyone in the world was wrong; everyone was evil. I felt we were all damned to hell. There was no hope, no brightness in the future. I felt a great sense of guilt for even thinking. I felt I couldn’t take it any longer. I got up from my knees and walked briskly out of the church. A sobbing old woman stepped in front of me at the doorway and humbly begged for pesetas for the Virgin’s shrine. I was blinded by a fear of the ugliness in life. She appeared as an evil person. I mumbled something about I had no pesetas as I brushed by her. Rudi followed close behind and we headed into the barren landscape of the Spanish countryside to the west.

Would our gasoline last?

NEXT: The barren plains of Spain

Note about “My Story” by Rohn Engh. The travel years were 1957 to 1959. The first draft was written between 1960-’61 in Afton, MN but never published. The author has revived the manuscript. Drawings, sketches, and photos (Rolleicord/B&W) are by the author. For other stories and books by Rohn Engh:
“A Simple Garden Book” (1976) Look for it on E-Bay or Amazon Books
“Somethingness” (2002) Horse Creek Press Look for it at LuLu.com
“PhotoSourceBOOK” (2000-2008) Look for it on Amazon
“Sell & ReSell Your Photos” (1982) Writers Digest Books (five editions)
“sellphotos.com” (1999) Writer’s Digest Books, (F&W Publishing)
Rohn Engh is the publisher of The PhotoLetter,
PhotoDaily, and PhotoStockNOTES.
Autographed 8x10 photos and drawings by the author are available
. Phone 715 248 3800, x21. Ask for Bruce Swenson.