I look at the clock, halfway across the room. The little red numbers show me that it’s 3 a.m. I wonder again if I’m sane doing this. I go back to sleep for another five minutes, and am woken this time by my conscience. I told Jose I’d be there, and I can’t go back on my word. What would the guys think of me? I have to prove myself, and this is the time. I roll heavily out of my waterbed and step over a pile of clothes to get to the light switch. I flick it on. The lights are so bright that they shock my senses and leave me wondering if they cause hangovers. Turn it off. I think I’ll just get dressed in the dark.
Pulling on my dirty, threadbare Wranglers, I strap a worn but sturdy leather belt around my waist. I can see the rips and oilstains on my jeans even without the light, and I wonder if they’ll last through the day. Right now they could literally stand up alone in a corner, so soaked are they with dark grape pulp. A dirty t-shirt and an old flannel complete my attire, and I top it off with my hat and work boots. The ballcap, crusted with sticky grape juice, is supposed to be light gray, but right now it looks more like black. I strain up the stairs from my basement room, my quadriceps sore and feeling like they’ll snap at any second. I grab my keys and walk outside into the cold darkness to start my big Chevy diesel truck. Hurrying back inside, I quietly throw a few snacks into a brown bag and fill a large red jug with water. Then I slip out the back door and through the gate to my truck.
I climb in, then sit listening to the comforting rumble of the diesel engine for a moment. I shift into gear, turning on the radio as I ease out of the driveway. Changing my mind, I turn off the radio. It’s too early for music. I’ll just enjoy the silence for now.
Again I wonder if I’m crazy, and as if to answer myself, I think back over the 174 previous grape season that my forefathers have done the same thing. I’m sure that none of my forebears complained, but instead stoically did what needed to be done. I guess it’s some men’s lot in life to do this.
After a ten-mile country drive, I arrive and scan the ranch yard for Jose’s blue truck. “He must have left! Darnit!” Discouraged and a little worried, I head, flashilight in hand, for my small brown Chevy S-10 work truck. I take off at top speed for the field we’ll be harvesting after checking the fluid and fuel levels.
When I get there multiple truck headlights guide me to the back corner of the vineyard, where the guys are warming up two giant field tracotrs. These tractors are so large that they barely fit in the vine rows, and driving them requires special skill and sensitivity. Behind the tractors are the real work horses. Two huge, new, yellow steel monstrosities glimmer in the moonlight. These Vinestar grape harvesters are the latest in viticultural technology. As I stand in awe, watching the guys swarm around the machines like a pack of ants around a picnic, I feel a hand clap me on the shoulder, rousing me from my sleepy reverie. It’s Jose. “I dina’ know if you was gonna’ make it,” he chuckles, beaming at me with pride. Jose is my boss, the foreman of my uncle’s farming operation. Each man on Jose’s crew is his son, and he’s glad to see that I made it in time to start this morning. “Casi estamos listo. Comprendes?” “Sí, Jose, comprendo,” I yawned. “You’re gonna’ be cleanup again today. Tienes flashlight?” He asked. “Yeah, I got one, thanks.” I replied.
I walk blearily over to greet the rest of my crew and finish greasing the harvester, or “la machina,” as the guys call it. I knew today was going to be a long day, but I didn’t yet fully appreciate how long. At this point, I start coming to terms with the stiff coldness of the early morning air around me. I shiver despite my two layers, and jog clumsily back to my truck to grab a jacket. As I pull on my jacket, I wish desperately for gloves, then turn around to see that my harvester is positioned in the first vine row. With a loud roar, the fans come on, then the conveyor belts start their noisy, infinite path with a continuous clackety-clack. The final component, the vine-shakers, comes on. They move too rapidly to be seen. The violence with which the vines are shaken makes me shudder. The word rape floats through my mind, and I wonder how appropriate that comparison is. It is certainly the best one I can think of. The tractor starts moving, slowly at first, with the harvester in tow. I walk behind the harvester on the left side, carefully avoiding the path of the powerful fans. They pick leaves out of the conveyors and send them rocketing out towards the ground. Inevitably, there is also a large amount of grape juice travelling with the grape leaves to the ground. To stand in the path of the fans is to be baptized in the sticky, gross, raw grape juice.
The harvester continues with me in tow. I scan the ground for dropped grape bunches. Finding these, I strip them from their branch with my hand and toss them into the large gondola which receives the harvested grapes. Soon cuts start to appear on my hands. Old cuts are quickly re-opened, as well, and grape juice oozes into the exposed raw flesh. The acidity of the grape juice combines with the freezing cold of the morning to make my hands throb with pain. After only an hour, the conveyor belts are clogged. I bound up the ladder on the back of the harvester and strain to open the fan coverings. Just as I thought. The conveyors are plugged at the fans with excess grapes. I stick my hand in the mass of grapes to start unclogging the mess, and quickly pull my hand out. It’s cold! It feels like these grapes have been in a freezer! I’m not sure if my hands, already numb and hurting from the exposure to the freezing morning air, will be able to complete the job. But I know that it has to be done, so I stick my hands back into the fan compartments and start removing handfuls of freezing grapes. After ten minutes, I stop. I don’t think I can continue. My hands hurt so badly that I wonder if I’m going to suffer from frostbite. I’ve skied without gloves on numerous occasions, and I’ve always been pretty tolerant of the cold, but this was far worse than any of that.
“Que paso, guerro? No puedes hacerlo?” comes a call from the ground. Great. That’s just what I need. The Mexican guys thinking I’m a weak white kid who can’t function.
“No, lo tengo,” I reply and stick my hands back in to finish the job. After twenty-five slow-moving minutes of frozen hell, I am finally able to fasten the fan-covers and climb off the back of the harvester. I motion to the tractor-driver, the fans fire up, and the moving circus rumbles slowly on its way.
An hour turns into two. From the top of the harvester, I look out at the other harvester. Lighted extensively, it looks like a submarine exploring the still-dark vine rows on the other side of the field. By the time daylight kisses the vineyard, it already feels like we’ve put in a full day of work. But we drone on, without breaks, striving mindlessly to get to the end of the next row. At ten o’clock, the heat of the day is becoming uncomfortable. Stripping off my jacket and flannel shirt, I leave them with Rigo in the cab of the tractor pulling the harvester. By now I’ve been walking quickly for six and a half straight hours over rough ground, with frequent trips up the ladder to make sure the conveyor belts stay unclogged. My legs are starting to hurt, and I’m beginning to wonder how I’m going to make it until the end of the day.
Noon comes, and we stop for lunch. We have a half hour. We don’t dare stop for any longer than that. From where I sit propped against a grapevine, I look around to see most of the Mexican guys asleep on the ground. They’ve learned how to do this after many twenty-four and twenty-six hour shifts without any more breaks than we’ll have today. Munching slowly on my plain, white, American, mostly tasteless lunch, I long for some of the home-made tacos that my compañeros are eating. I wonder how long we’ll go tonight. Next thing I know, everyone is up and walking toward their places. We start the controlled violence of the Vinestar, then trudge onward down one long row and up the next.
Dusk approaches, and twilight permeates everything. My skin is sticky from cabernet juice and sore from sunburn. Cold again creeps into the air. The sun continues on its fatal path, terminating at the horizon, dying once again, and leaving only darkness to mourn its passing. I watch the last glimmer of sunlight disappear from the sky from the top of the harvester, then I shiver and pull on my sticky jacket. By now, I can only trudge unthinkingly onward, hoping that the day will end soon. The cold increases, until it has become the dominant force in the dark night.
We plod on, and on, and on. Dusk turns to dark, bringing with it new lows on the thermometer. Now, I walk to keep warm, too tired to do much else. Yet somehow, my role is fulfilled. My tasks seem to accomplish themselves, as if by some magic contriving that I am lucky enough to posess. Night becomes late night, and soon it’a approaching ten o’clock. The end of the vineyard looms closer with every row, and it seems that we are going to push on until the end. Eleven comes, and twelve goes. We push doggedly down the last row, too tired to rejoice. The looks I see on the faces around me must be the same expressions worn by battle-weary soldiers. Masks of flesh, heads of steel, and minds of putty.
We stumble about the long process of cleaning the machine, hosing down the intricate parts with cold water, which splashes everywhere. We leave the machines where they are; we’ll move them tomorrow. With short, mumbled phrases, we bid each other good night, knowing full well that our first experience on the morrow will be to greet each other once again. I drive home in silence, glad to be rid of the pulsing, roaring fans. My head still throbs with their monotonous tone, and my clothes and skin wear their dirty, sticky by-product. Kicking off my boots, I walk in the back door of our country farmhouse, too exhausted to gaze on the orchards and vineyard illuminated by moonlight around me. I consume the cold dinner that has been waiting since this evening for my arrival. The house is quiet and my family is asleep, so I trip down the stairs, stripping off my clothes as I go. Too tired to even shower, I fall onto my waterbed and pull a blanket over me; I’m asleep instantly.
Beeep, beep, beep…
