Many moons ago, I wrote a blog called “From Behind the Light.” It was mostly personal stories. Some comics. This is one of the better entries, rewritten for your enjoyment.
You can read Part One of “The Asthma Killer” right here.
When Paco Jose was a small boy, all of the members his family were stricken with the dreaded disease asthma. His neighbors too, and their neighbors also. They were El Pueblo Que no Podía Respirar—The Village That Couldn’t Breathe.
Their little children were taught not to run far or very hard and the women could only manage to wash a few articles of clothing a day for fear of over-exerting themselves. The fields and crops were not producing their promised yield because the men couldn’t stand to get tend the farming in the cold morning air. Starvation was setting in.
Then, one day, when Paco Jose was about 11-years of age, a mysterious woman with rosy, vibrant cheeks and hair like white straw came to town. She never gave her name, though many would later claim she was an angel sent from God. It was she that taught them the cure for asthma and promised them that if they followed her very simple instructions, every man, woman and child would recover and they would be El Pueblo Que Acostumbrado para no Podía Respirar—The Village that Usedta Could Not Breath.
Danny: What did she tell you to do?
Paco Jose: Something very simple. At first, it was so simple we did not believe her. We scoffed at her and mocked her wild hair. Her instructions did not make any sense. Then, a wise elder in our village stepped forward and said we could either take our maximum of a dozen steps a day and die in our pride or, if she was right, we could live in humility. So, we did it.
D: What? What was it?
PJ: Simple. Take an onion, cut it in half and bore out the middle. Pour sugar into the hole you’ve dug and cook the onion with the sugar inside until the sugar turns golden brown. Then, you eat it. All of it.
D: That’s kind of gross.
PJ: Very. I sweat onion for a week but—(breathes deeply)—I’m cured.
D: Amazing.
PJ: The whole village was cured. Our farms were restored to their proper vitality and we were able to produce so much crop with our newfound strength that I was later able to go to college to learn English and work in the United States.
D: So why are you on a Ranch?
PJ: I love cows. Always have.
When Danny finished telling his story, all of us at Game Night were laughing. It sounded preposterous, but Danny assured us that Paco Jose was deadly serious. And that’s when we got an idea.
Why not give it a shot?
To be continued…
