Tree Man

One of the last days working in Noto i was assigned to the duty of clean up crew for an arborist.  the first job of the day of course involved waking the tractor beast with Massimo, loading it and following it up the mountain to the work place.  I made it my business to understand the trails to and from the orchard and the loading and unloading routine of the cart for work.  This day I arrived ahead of the tractor.  My destination was clear.  It was marked by the buzz of a saw and the vision of a minuscule figure bouncing about from one tree to the next.  It was like watching a dancer from the nose bleed section of a theater.  On this day as many others, I was accompanied by the three ponies in toe.  Massimo smiled with friendly suspicion when he arrived and I smiled back knowingly.  It had become a practice now that I understood the difference between a trail man made and a trail made from the play of ponies, to pick cachi fruit for me and for the ponies on my way back to the house after work.  All four of us, me and the beasts are quite fond of them.  They of course had become quite fond of me.  I never did confess this to Massimo but I think he definitely knew I was up to something.  I also failed to tell him about The carrots and the cabbage and the apples that I used to entice the four leggeds into a friendship, ultimately rendering them into dog like behavior.


I have to introduce you to Stephania at this point.    She was not a WWOOFer but she stayed and worked on the farm for a short time while i was there.  Stepania is a gentle, kind spirit, with eyes that smile and tons of patience.  She laughs easily at herself and at others.  the combination of all these things made the fact that she spoke no English and I spoke no Italian an easy difference to reconcile.  I think she was my first Italian teacher really.  She would move her face, hands and body in anyway necessary to be able to tell me what she needed to.  I would  carry my black mail bag with a pen, notebook and dictionary to the field everyday that we worked together.  By this day that habit had been dissolved.  One day after expressing my frustration by biting my dictionary, she took it away from me and said in Italian, "You do not need this Marianne", putting it aside and gently shaking her finger at it and then at me, like mother to a baby that had just grabbed something she should not have.  I laughed madly and played my version of Italian language charades from then on.  I never used the dictionary again with her.  In retrospect it was with her that i started to understand how to simplify what i need to say so that i could be understood and work with the basic list of verbs that i had been teaching myself.  I started to think like a Dick and Jane book.  I realized that the first step in learning this language for me was to just get down to the very basics.  Like a child in its first few years, they listen more than they speak and when they do speak it usually has something to do with sleeping, eating, feeling or going to the potty.  I used this as my starting point and relaxed a little.  I was not afraid of being laughed at anymore or afraid to try.  I accepted that I will make mistakes and probably say something crass and inappropriate by accident but I will be forgiven.  More than likely, in the situation where I am very wrong I will learn the most.

After arriving with the ponies and Stephania, I was introduced to Tree Man, Signor Peppe.  He offered me his paw in a bear like grip, in the other he held a chain saw like a pistol.  I was more than half a head height taller than him so I was surprised by the size of his hands.  I think years of this work had stretch them. They were as rough as 80 grit sand paper and his fingers wrapped easily around the back of my hand almost meeting at the finger tips.  He smiled widely and said something that I did not understand.  It seemed pleasant so I nodded and smiled politely.  He and Massimo spoke briefly.  Tree Man held his face up to the sky a little,  stretching to check the direction of the wind. He turned to face in the opposite direction.  He pointed  to a spot, handed me a bucket with a small blowtorch, some paper and a machete.  He spoke some more, but again I did not understand but figured out from the contents of the bucket that my job was fire. "Cut some grass, some small olive saplings and start a fire nest for the burn."  Massimo confirmed.    I have a feeling of satisfaction in moments like these.  It seems the sum of my life experiences are helping me through some times of guessing.  Stephania's job was to start to gather the small wood.  Together she and I would make a separate pile of large wood that would be taken up to the house.  We were trimming nut trees this day, almonds, walnuts and chestnut trees.  As I busied myself with my task, I watched Tree Man carve the soil around young olive trees.  In one hand a chain saw, in the other a zappa, or a hoe.  three whacks to the ground behind the tree and there was a perfect bowl to hold water on one side that gently tapered down to allow excess water to run off.  He was amazing.  He stood completely upright and swung the hoe, slicing away earth.  The smooth sound of whomp whomp whomp pounding into the ground, rhythmically paused by the muffled swoosh of feet moving from tree to tree in the tall grass was soothing and hypnotic. It seemed like he was waiting for something.  He never looked away from what he was doing. He patiently continued but stopped suddenly as if someone had arrived.  

I could not see or feel what stopped him but swiftly with one hand he grabbed a 14 foot wooden ladder and placed it in an almond tree.  His chain saw still like a pistol he climbed the ladder with as much ease and rhythm has he had walking on the ground.  He paused and looked at the tree  and selected.  Limbs large and small fell with the lash of the blade and the small man seemed to wait again.  He paused for  a moment, observing to see if his task was complete for this tree.  His closed thin lips curled up always with a sparkle in his eyes.   He climbed down called Massimo over and handed him his saw.  Tree Man placed the ladder in the next tree and this time Massimo went up.  Massimo looked like a giraffe on the ladder.  It was so different then the Tree Man, I burped out a giggle. Like a shy school girl, I covered my mouth and looking away.  Tree man pointed to limbs from the ground and Massimo trimmed.  This routine was repeated until Massimo trimmed on his own and Tree Man watched.  i was a witness to a graduation of sorts.  As Massimo progressed he was less giraffe like and his trees were sparse and obedient as Tree Man's.

"How do you know where to cut the tree?"  I asked Massimo

"Well Signore Peppe is trying to teach me to wait for the tree to tell me?"   He smiled, handed his saw to Signore Peppe, waved good bye and left for the house. 

For the remainder of the day I worked alone with Stephania and Tree Man.  Tree Man spoke and pointed and smiled, I would look to Stephania for the Italian version of his directions and proceed to complete the task and try my best to understand the Sicilian dialect.  By the end of the day I was understanding a teeny tiny bit.  It wasn't the words really it was more the gestures and the pointing. For the most part I just gauged my progress by his grin and the way he moved his hands.  He congratulated me like one would a hero, grabbing my shoulder with one paw and shaking my opposite hand like one shakes a table cloth after a meal.  He respected WWOOFers, admired their hard work and willingness to do whatever was necessary.  He told me he will climb trees until he either dies or can no longer walk,  he knows nothing else.  It did not matter what he was paid, trees were something he needed like air.  When I meet his he was 73 years old.