Daniela Bedolla | D5f | fin

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Daniela Bedolla

District 5

Fifteen

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Aesthetic Things

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Daniela Playlist

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I. 

The world was always at war with itself.

She has heard the stories, passed down from generations that have seen the same stars and taken the same breaths at the foot of these hills. Patience lost staring up at the infinite overhead to question why there could never be peace, only violence. A world where they had known, since before the dark days, since long before – that for all the change and progress, for all the meandering out through the wilderness, they were lost amongst themselves.

And that hatred, sowed into the hearts of man, bled clean and true onto the earth, rooted so deep, that there was no escape from this breathless loathing. Their tawny skin and dark curled hair, their laughter and their songs, their sweet breads and all these things they could celebrate were foreign. Unknowns in a world that wanted to have answers for everything. That wanted the sun and the moon and stars all the same color, all the same light.

So, it was to be told to generations that they were to bow to this unending mandala of sameness, of wanting to be just as they were seen, or else – perish. Look to the sheep that wander along the hills, that dare not to go alone or turn their fleece a darker shade of grey, lest they be separated or torn asunder. Safer to hide behind that smile, to nod along to the world that grows smaller each day when things are forgotten, un-remembered, disappeared for sake of wanting not to come apart.

But not all things yield to this sameness.

For at the edge of the mountains toward the rolling hills and beyond the keep of deciduous trees, there was a sprawling ranch that grew unremarkable; where to know the past was to treasure a secret. Where to love oneself meant finding that difference, reveling in the place where you were not another. That to be true meant to discover what did not fit, to celebrate the breathless unknown.

Daniela did not blend. She could not fade, not since the moment she was born. All the firsts that came along – the first girl born, the eldest, the colicky child that would not sleep restfully – not matter if she held a desire to be at peace, she would never find where she could fit.

And yet, down the long gravel trail leading to the farmhouse of stone, pressed back against those hills she could discover a world that was far removed from all the sounds of the capitol, of a world falling apart.

Perhaps the world had forgotten they had existed. The Bedollas did not travel to town but two times a year to trade the heifers that would bring them enough capital to pass on another year.

The news of war had been met with certainty. Her father had shaken his head and whispered that it was to be the way of man and all things broken; that the greedy would take what they needed and leave the rest to starve. He was already forty-five and no spring chicken, all mustache and less face. But he loved his wife, kept the ranch running so smoothly no one could question his devotion. Had adored his daughters, raised them well, honest, and true. He would not beg them to stay on this farm when the time came but his heart ached to hope that their little world would not change. That the dangers that lurked on the long road to town and behind the doors of the city dwelling people would not take their curiosity and tarnish it.

War had always existed, their grandfather would say, just as the people they’d once been had to flee from one place to another to survive. And that they did not look back over their shoulders as they fled, as they sought a better life. That this was not cowardice but bravery, to put ahead their children and their future, to think beyond all the things that they would be leaving behind.

But could they survive this life, one so far removed, fires lit in the wood burning stove or kerosene running lamps across the farm, when so much was building up around them? When their automobile sat collecting dust because their father refused to get another tank of gasoline, preferring to ride his horse?

Daniela and her sister Aurelia would often dream of the world after the war, beyond the radio talking of rebels threatening to break the world apart into something shiny and new. They would listen to the strumming of guitars and the sound of those low country songs, ones singing of death, of women losing babies, of mothers and their children, of fathers all alone and they would think – perhaps our world is dark, dark as the bottom of a well. That there is so much pain and sadness that war was the only way to burn it all away, until what was left made ash to sprinkle across the fields.

And yet, they could not believe, turned over in their beds and staring at one another, or the moon through the window on the far side of the wall, that destiny could always be so cruel.

Sometimes they would dream of those guitars, of singing together across the radio, where others could hear their voices and could find space in their hearts for them. And though Aurelia could sing so sweet and so true she made their father cry, even Daniela could provide a sweet harmony, a softness that would never did fade.

‘Some day, I’ll write a song about us,’ Aurelia liked to whisper, ‘That no one will be able to forget.’

Daniela would pray that her sister’s dreams came true, even if she were not around to see them.

Maybe one day they’d go beyond the mountains, across the river and to the ocean, too.

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A dozen eggs, some cabbage, potatoes, and carrots.

She’d memorized the order, reciting each item as though it were poetry, ready to sing out the words just as soon as she saw the girl come across the hill.

Her father would leave the farm stand in Daniela’s hands just as soon as she’d turned twelve. Old enough to keep inventory of what was needed for the men and women that would travel from farms a way’s over. Their brown speckled eggs were known for being a size larger than the closer farms, and her mother said the secret was singing to the chickens every time they were fed. To which Daniela would counter they were willing to give some of better cuts of soybean or sunflower seeds, but she couldn’t deny that the sound of her mother’s voice was enough to stop most in their tracks to listen.

Dayna had come on a cool spring morning, her wool coat pulled tight against her body, her long black hair cascading down her shoulders. Two big, brown eyes that made Daniela pause and forget what she’d said, having the poor girl repeat her order at least twice while she scurried around the wooden planks of the farm stand searching for a basket and tossing the items together in a burlap sack. She took pains to set out the carton and count out the eggs before wrapping the box in a bow of twine to keep it secure.

When she’d said goodbye, Daniela had felt the words tangle at the back of her throat. Too scared to ask where she’d come from – near or far – and if she’d ever come back again. But as she faded off over one of the hills and into the light of the afternoon, Daniela at least had the stretch of paper she’d written the order on. She kept the yellow slip in her pocket, tucked away like a sort of good luck charm. Something to look at in her bed before she twisted the kerosene lamp and brought darkness to her bedroom.

“I made up stories about you,” Daniela would tell Dayna, “That you’d been traveling across the districts, up toward the edge of the world while it still was putting itself back together.”

Now they lie in grass under a set of maples in the heat of the summer sun. Two bodies warm from an afternoon of nibbling at conchas and sipping condensed milk. Daniela whispers how lovely Dayna’s hair is, all curled around the pink of the blanket. Their hands entwined in one another as they forget about the chickens that need to be fed, or to check on the cows out toward the edge of the ranch to make sure they hadn’t gone grazing too far.

But life has become so much more these past few months, more than the little piece of life that she’d ever known from her mother and father. And all those stories, the histories of a world lost and gone far away, the images of desolation, of burning countryside and men marching, shooting, dying, they were just that. A different world than what lay on the pink gingham.

More than the courage it took for Daniela to say, after three orders of the same dozen eggs, some cabbage, potatoes, and carrots,

‘Where are you from? Could you spend a moment here, with me?’

Such courage that Daniela had not seen in herself, the same that her mother and father would talk about – her patience, that led to her deeper understanding. A quiet courage that wouldn’t have been born on a battlefield a generation before, but still fresh enough from war that she could pause to understand and want such human connection. A sharedness of want, to discover, as the world awoke from plumes of ash and regret, there are good people here, aren’t there? People like me?

Dayna was sixteen and had three brothers; she grew up listening to calypso and gallo pinto; her favorite color was blue, but she was partial to green; she worked on a horse farm, which she didn’t mind, so much as she didn’t want to be there the rest of her natural life.

‘What about chickens, or cattle?’ Daniela would ask to silence.

They’d listen to Aurelia sing, writing songs or putting on plays together with the tall grass behind them.

Daniela would pluck at her old guitar, passed down from her father, and Dayna would stare long enough to make her blush, too. Until she’d told her that all she thought about was how she played the guitar, hair hanging down as her fingers graced the strings, plucking chords and keeping time.

‘You put life into those old songs,’ She’d say.

“I’d go around the world playing songs,” Daniela says to her, all serious and quiet. “Up on a wooden stage, with hot lights flush against me and a whole crowd. Aurelia would sing and I’d just play – and they’d get up on their feet for an encore, too.”

‘I’d help you sell tickets,’ Dayna trailed a finger along her arm, eyes drawn down to the blanket, ‘Though I don’t think it would be hard, not when they heard you play.’

And they’d spend their lives on the road, traveling out together, off into the distance of towns and cities. Of long nights pushing through darkness, carts across cobble stones, rain at their backs, sun burning down, snow drifting across the road, whole stretches of time where all they did was find places like this hill, to stare up in the sky.

They’d be free from having to wake up at four in the morning, before the first light. Free from all the rush of politics, of all the ugly that had come to pass, because they would live in the moment. And those memories of what they’d seen and who they’d lost, they could tuck them away in photo books or lockets, in stories they would tell one another over dinner, because their hearts would beat only for the here, the now.

Their dreams would be the truth, all sinew and flesh ready to press on toward the next great mount. No matter if one or a hundred came to hear them play, they would have one another. No need for riches, no need for some home that would weigh down around their ankles. Or little world where they had to be just as everyone else, toiling, toiling, toiling until they turned around and fell to dust.

‘Let’s never stay, then,’ Dayna says to her, all close and quiet and beautiful. ‘We can run away, just as soon as we get old enough.’

As soon as she could see Aurelia would be okay, as soon as Dayna’s brothers became men. As soon as the farm made enough money that they didn’t worry each season might have been their last. As soon as Dayna’s father stopped drinking so much. As soon as they could get their hands on enough money. As soon as Daniela learned to play in the fifth position.

‘Someday,’ Dayna says, head against her shoulder.

“Soon,” Daniela replies, eyes on the clouds stretched out overhead.

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