Day LXXVII

The Volcano

     The fermentation process was a bit different over there, that’s what guys said. No two beers had the same alcohol content. You could drink one beer, and it might be like three point two. But the next one could be like five or six point something, so one beer could put you on your ass. To this day I don’t know if they were pulling my leg or not, but I never had a problem with the beer.

     It seemed everybody knew everybody over there, because when the weather station dude showed up, he came right up  to me.

     “You must be the new guy, uh!”

     “Weather station?”

     “Welcome to Clark, me man.”

     At the weather station we used to take a smoke break, and go to the back with a cup of joe. I remember looking out from the porch, and seeing Mount Pinatubo, which was not far away. It worried me, it made me nervous, that we worked so close to a volcano.

      “Yo man, it ain’t blown it’s stack in fi hunet yee ahs, man.”

      “Yea, dude, ain’t nothing to worry about,” another guy added.

    We were told it had been dead a long time, and there was nothing to worry about. Most guys went along with it, as the authorities laid their comforting line of bull shit on us. But I don’t believe in dead volcanoes, even if they haven’t been active for a gazillion years. Only God knows when they’re dead. So whenever we boarded our truck to go to work, I was nervous, my stomach was always queasy, and I lit up. The only time I felt good was when my shift was over, I was in the truck on my way back to the barracks, and I could see Pinatubo fading in the distance.